05 Aug 2015

Botswana Railways (BR) chief executive officer, Mr Dominic Ntwaagae said the passenger train will arrive in December if all goes according to plan.

Briefing the media during the on-going BR customer consultative day in Gaborone recently, Mr Ntwaagae said the agreed arrival date for the passenger train commonly known as Blue train is December. 

He however noted that during the bidding process companies failed to meet the set requirements which he said took three months.

Nonetheless, he said the company which has been awarded the tender for the purchase of the locomotive and coaches is adamant that they will deliver the train within the stipulated time. He also said he will keep consulting the media on the issue so that Batswana are updated.

He said they have confidence in the company and if there are any challenges regarding the arrival of the blue train information will be shared with Batswana as they have longed for it.

Regarding the customer consultative day, Mr Ntwaagae said as BR they acknowledge that they are competing in an ever evolving environment with various factors at play so they want to stand out hence their continuous effort to engage with customers to identify both their strength and weakness. 

He said it is through a platform like the customer consultative day where stakeholders come together to discuss issues affecting their businesses. He highlighted that it is an important activity as it provides a platform for their customers and stakeholders to share experiences and challenges with a view to improving rail performance.

He said the forum will also provide an excellent opportunity to interact, promote excellent customer and build solid customer relationship with all their customers from different industries.

He said in an effort to improve customer service, this year’s theme is ‘“Aligning Railways services to customer requirements and the way forward’’ which is meant to gear themselves and uphold one of their key 2012-17 strategic themes of customer centricity.

BR director of business development, Mr Stephen Makuke said in his welcoming remarks that on a regional context, the regional railways through the Southern African Railway Association (SARA) are also seriously addressing customer service issues with great enthusiasm.

He said railway infrastructure development plays a key role not only in economic development but also in poverty alleviation as it leads to job creation and reduces income inequalities. He however said they are mindful of the challenges caused by their infrastructural deficit.

He said their aim is to improve all levels of their operational activities and they have confronted issues of infrastructure fatigue and track fractures head on through appropriate upgrades programmes.

Mr Makuke mentioned that the dry port or sea rail as they call it is in operation and said from January to date the port has handled well over 1 000 imported vehicles and that they are now working on the preparations of phase two of the project. Ends