20 Mar 2017

Francistown West Member of Parliament (MP) Mr Ignatius Moswaane has expressed concern over perpetrators who continue mining sand without authorisation from Department of Mines.

Mr Moswaane's concern stems from illegal river sand mining that has been a concern over a continued period of time in Francistown, where rivers such as the Ntshe and Tati were  completely under siege.

In an interview, the MP expressed his displeasure over the unlicensed sand miners who go around at night excavating rivers in order to get sand for re-sale.

He said ‘this criminal’ practice was mostly caused by the licensed companies that excavate and sell sand, who render their service at inflated prices, leaving clients with no option but to buy from these fly-by-night sand miners and sometimes clients getting their hard earned cash taken away from them.

Furthermore, he also explained that there was need for the government to come up with some interventions to help alleviate this problem.

“This is greatly killing the eco-tourism not only in our rivers but around the country where some of the rivers are used for some purposes including getting drinking water from,” he said.

The MP urged  people to report these perpetrators to the police and relevant authorities since these people live and operate in the very community they lived in and people should understand that this river were  not for the benefit of the government but for the whole community.

In an interview, a resident of Monarch, Mr Thabo Willie, a 29 year-old also expressed his worries over the depletion of the rivers due to these activities that were ‘uncalled for’. ENDS