20 Sep 2017

The Assistant Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Mr Frans Van Der Westhuizen has expressed concern about some officials who compete for tenders with the general public.

He said small contractors could be engaged in maintenance works, as the work did require much expertise.

Mr Van Der Westhuizen told a full council session that the ministry had been receiving calls from small contractors requesting the minister’s intervention as they felt that they were denied the opportunity to work at the expense of the officials.

“This was disturbing and I urge you to stop the practice and let local contractors be given the opportunity to work. Officials have to supervise them and ensure they do the right thing and the council gets value for money,” he stressed.

Mr Van Der Westhuizen advised the council to improve on project management in order to save government from losing millions of pula unnecessarily.

In addition, he said the Performance Monitoring Committee (PMC) should monitor projects implementation and all those contractors awarded tenders.

He said the government continued to spend huge sums of money on projects consultants and supervisors but it was disturbing as the ministry continued to receive reports of mammoth project delays, costing government money which could had been utilised elsewhere to support a needy Motswana.

The assistant minister mentioned that there had been a number of projects in some districts which had failed the final test at great cost to government and the communities were supposed to benefit.

Mr Van Der Westhuizen underscored the need for those in charge to up their game and understand that projects were meant to benefit the communities but not for political mileage as some people might think.

The council leadership was urged to take a keen interest in project issues and ensure they were delivered within budget and on time, adding that infrastructure project which was recently awarded needed to be closely monitored.

Furthermore, the assistant minister noted that the ministry was worried that despite the fact that they had put in place management structure and resourced them in the form of qualified engineers, architects, quantity surveyors, project management in the district leave a lot to be desired.

He said councils engaged consultants at a cost and failed to ensure that government gets value for money and challenged leadership to introspect on the issue to identify the root cause of the problem.

For their part, Councillors called on the assistant minister to give them powers just like executive officers so that they could run the council effectively and develop the district.

Some requested for their inclusion in the adjudication and tender committees so that they could provide oversight.

Cllr Moedi Modiegi, who is also the chairperson of Maun Administrative Authority revealed that at times it was difficult for them to reverse some decision because the tender had already been awarded.

Cllr Reaboka Mbulawa concurred with the assistant minister that project management remained a challenge and yet the council was unable to find the root cause.  

He said the council was failing on that area because there were no competent risk managers who could manage project objectives. Ends