11 Oct 2016

Chairperson of BotswanaPost Service Group Mr Ogaketse Mathware has appealed to Mahalapye residents to make use of services and products offered by the post office.

Mr Mathware said this during the official opening of the refurbished ultra-modern Mahalapye Post Office in Mahalapye on Monday (0ctober 10).

He explained that the government has invested P2.9million towards the refurbishment of Mahalapye Post Office to help with overall service delivery improvements.

He said Mahalapye residents would notably have a bank with competitive service offerings. The refurbishment has allowed for the housing of Botswana Savings Bank, Botswana Couriers and Logistics and BotswanaPost under one roof, meaning that there is a better provision of services to the public.

Therefore, he urged Mahalapye community to support home-grown businesses and support Botswana Savings Bank and utilise their facilities. “Let’s bank with them and get loans with them. In that manner you will be preserving and growing the local economy,’’ he said.

Mr Mathware said he was sure many were beginning to wonder whether this merger will ever materialise that saw the Botswana Post and Savings Group holding company being established.

However, he noted that the challenge was to now get this development to bear fruit for the local communities, and the government will also expect to receive return on investment.

He said BotswanaPost through her extensive footprint of 127 post offices nationwide, and one virtual branch accessed digitally through their mobile phones, has over the years made it possible for government and the private businesses to reach the nation with their products and services.

He explained that they have seen the introduction of the funeral policy being availed to the communities, the introduction of the PosoCard ensuring convenience and a more secure way of disbursing pensioners’ allowances.

Mr Mathware said the elderly now enjoy the service which allows them to bank their money as opposed to the old voucher system when they were expected to withdraw all their money.

He said also electricity purchases and payment of water bills have also been availed to all Batswana through the post office, a service which has now been availed 24hrs a day through the BotswanaPost Mobile Application.

He noted that indeed, the post’s journey to excellence has seen a most welcome effort to transform, modernise and diversify not only the way of doing business, but the infrastructure as well.

He said, notwithstanding the difficult economic times they find themselves in, clearly the government has heard their pleas for the need to speed and prioritise the refurbishment of some post offices by approving a P40m grant through the Universal Service Obligation Fund and to ensure this merger takes off.

For his part, BotswanaPost CEO Mr Cornelius Ramatlhakwane said the upgrading was meant to improve the operational efficiency through the provision of agency, postal, courier and logistics as well as financial and banking services all under one roof.

Mr Ramatlhakwane applauded the government for striving to ensure that no one was left behind in the provision and accessing of communications, financial and logistics services, which was in line with the 2016-18 strategy of the Universal Postal Union.

He said the post office has over the years transformed to be a service provider as opposed to the traditional post office that people knew. ‘We have automated all our counters, added new products and services but continued to also provide the traditional postal products,’ he said.
 

Therefore, he said the post office although modernised has not forgotten their  traditional customers. ENDS