03 Sep 2015

President Lt Gen. Seretse Khama Ian Khama said government has resolved to look for funds to assist deserving youth projects that need re-funding after being funded through the Youth Development Fund (YDF).

Addressing a kgotla meeting in Letlhakeng on Thursday September 3, Lt. Gen Khama said this is meant to ease the current arrangement where the youth are required to approach the Citizen Entrepreneurship Development Agency (CEDA) when they need to upgrade their current projects as most of them complain that CEDA requirements are too steep for them to fulfill.

He said initially, government thought of using the YDF to re-fund the projects, but later resolved that YDF should only be reserved for start-up projects.

“We are still discussing the issues with the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning, and once everything has been ironed out, the Ministry of Youth, Sport and Culture will start re-funding deserving projects,” he said.

On other issues, President Khama urged civil servants to desist from the practice of tossing customers around who come to seek assistance at their offices; a concern which he said has been noted across all government departments.

He said the practice amounts to poor customer service and as such, government is putting measures in place to address it This includes introducing suggestion boxes in offices as well as the recently introduced name tags for all civil servants for ease of identification .

He however advised that suggestions boxes are not only meant for complaints as customers can also use them to appreciate good customer service from civil servants. 

Furthermore, President Khama advised the Water Utilities Corporation to arrange a payment plan for customers who have high bills that cannot be cleared in a short period of time. He also advised them to desist from cutting water connection as the first option of forcing people to settle their bills.

President Khama’s responses came after the youth in the village complained that they face challenges when they want a re-fund to improve their projects as CEDA has stiff requirements that they could not meet, such as security.

They therefore, suggested that the YDF should instead be used to re-finance the projects. The chairperson of the Village Development Committee, Mr Rahim Batshwaregi had also complained about the high water bills they incur from the corporation, saying that sometimes bills can go as high as P2 000.

In her response, the WUC regional manager, Ms Boitumelo Kgaodi explained that the issue of high water bills is mostly as a result of customers who stay for many months without paying, as well as leakages.

She said normally, cutting out water supply is done as a last resort, and is normally done when customers stay up to about six months without settling their bills. She however, advised that sometimes there could be human errors, and therefore advised customers to always come to their offices to discuss bills that are abnormally high so they can investigate. Ends