21 Feb 2018

A delegation of Members of Parliament (MPs) from Mozambique visited Botswana to benchmark on the overall administration of National Assembly.

In an interview, Deputy Speaker of National Assembly, Mr Kagiso Molatlhegi on Tuesday said Mozambique delegation benchmarked on Botswana’s experiences on revenue management, management of properties of national assembly and running of constituency offices.

He said it was their first interactions on a benchmarking mission with Mozambicans, but noted that it would be interesting to also learn how their Parliament was run, given the fact that they had a larger number of MPs.

“We only have 63 MPs and 57 constituencies, while in Mozambique there are 255 MPs, so their system is totally different from ours,” he said.

He said the visit that comprises the First Deputy Speaker, president of administration council, six MPs and three officials, would also strengthen their bilateral parliamentary relations, as they would also have the opportunity to interact with administration staff, given that they would want to copy the Botswana system.

For his part, Mozambique’s First Deputy Speaker, Mr Antonio Jose Amelia said they chose to benchmark with Parliament of Botswana because it was more experienced as compared to theirs.

He said Mozambique’s Parliament was young and inexperienced, hence there was a lot they could learn from Botswana’s vast experience.

“So far we have learnt quite a lot and we are going to implement a couple of initiatives learnt here,” he said.

He further highlighted that the benchmarking exercise had been an eye opener to them because their Parliament was complex as it had a large number of MPs and a large number of staff to administer.

“We have noticed that MPs from Botswana have homes where they stay with their families, which helps them to work more productively as they also have time to meet often as colleagues.
This is one good example that we desire and we will take it home,” he said. Ends