07 Dec 2016

Delegates from Genk City in Belgium visited Francistown City Council (FCC) to extend their twinning partnership and benchmark on other areas following their previous visit in 2014.

Speaking during tour of one of the projects on Tuesday (December 6), Nyangabwe Referral Hospital deputy superintendent, Dr Lowell Chansa said they were happy to have been part of the twinning partnership that was bearing fruits.

He said since its inception in 2004, the hospital saw an opportunity to collaborate with Genk City for medicinal education as they believed they could learn something from them.

Dr Chansa noted they also wanted to extend knowledge to management on HIV and AIDS issues and other health programmes, which are also in good progression.

Furthermore, he said the hospital is faced with a challenge of specialised nurses, therefore they signed an agreement to attach their students at Belgium and vice versa since 2011.

Dr Chansa added the students are so far having a smooth sail as they also have short courses in the nursing field and specialties, which exposes them to how things are done in Belgium and vice versa.

He appreciated the attachment training, adding the exchange student programme is a success, saying he wishes it could extend to qualified nurses at Genk so that they could also get experience.

He added they need support in training of the trainers of advanced life support so that all of their staff could be well trained.

For her part, Genk twinning delegation representative, Ms Parthoens Kathleen said she is happy with the growth of the partnership, saying she wishes it expands to other parts of the country.

She said so far exchange students programme, which allows two students only to be sent annually, is showing good results as the Genk students are showing the knowledge they have acquired.

Ms Kathleen said the students who come for attachment in Francistown are doing an impressive job and seem to become hard workers and their skills seem to be better, saying they are expecting to bring more students next year to study in the country.

She noted that the twinning development has helped them explore other options of projects that could empower the youth and development of infrastructure. ENDS