01 Feb 2017

Kweneng District Council (KDC) on Monday approved a P414 638 080 budget for 2017/2018 fiscal period.

When presenting the budget, KDC budget committee chairperson, Mr Motlhophi Leo, said P392 917 750 was anticipated as revenue support revenue (RSG) and about P22 million as own revenue.

He said own revenue sources were estimated to come from sanitation, which should collect around P10 million.

Other revenue would come from interests on investments at P2 914 570, staff rentals at around P3.4 million, matimela fund at about P1.3 million, trade licenses at P1.2 million and P2.4 million would come from other sources.

He said from the tentative expenditure, headquarters had been allocated P81 923 260, MAA/Lentsweletau sub allocated P130 050 330, Letlhakeng sub-district P104 055 260 whilst Mogoditshane/Thamaga Sub-district has been given P98 604 230 to use for the coming financial period.

In their comments, some councillors queried criterion used to allocate the money without looking at needs and location of the such sub-districts.

They said this often resulted in some sub-districts not attaining their targets.

They said Mogoditshane/Thamaga Sub-district, despite its proximity to the capital city, had seen zero growth both in development and services due to inadequate funding each financial year.

They said services in the sub-district were stretched by having to support influx of dwellers from the capital city who were often attracted by low house rentals.

Councillors said the district must drive the budget allocation such that the budget must recognise peculiarity of the district in relation to being remote or an urban area rather than being standard across.

Some councillors also decried slow and low revenue collection, which was still the same compared to five years ago instead of at least 10 per cent.

Cllr Ofentse Marama said development taking place in the district should increase revenue, which could be used to support development process.

In his welcome remarks, KDC chairperson, Mr Geoffrey Sibisibi cautioned that the country’s economy had not fully recovered from the economic crunch and as such the sub-district must strive to do more with little resource allocated to them.

He said councillors should always speak in unison when discussing district development agenda and also set their priority right, so that critical services gets funding for Batswana to benefit from developments intended for them.

Mr Sibisibi implored cllrs to work hard in turning Mogoditshane into an industrial hub which will in turn create employment for the district. BOPA