28 Feb 2018

Parliament has approved the over P2 billion budget request for departments under the ministry of Presidential Affairs, Governance and Public Administration.

The request, which is for the 2018/19 financial year, was presented by Presidential Affairs minister, Mr Eric Molale and it comprised P1 402 872 560 recurrent expenditure and P676  014 000 development expenditure.

Mr Molale explained that the recurrent expenditure represented an increase of 16.1 per cent from the previous financial year while the development expenditure was a slight increase of 0.77 per cent.

“The increase (in recurrent expenditure) is attributed mainly to increases in allocations of Office of the President due to new posts for district administration officers, maintenance of buildings, vehicle replacement as well as replacement of computers for district administration officers, Broadcasting Services due to new posts as well as the Directorate of Intelligence Services due to increases in new posts, external travel, office rentals and special investigations,” he explained.

The minister added that the largest share of P410 921 690 from the recurrent budget would be allocated to DIS followed by Office of the President with P366 575 320. He said the Department of Broadcasting would take the third largest share of P216 530 280 while the rest of the money would  be shared by the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime and other departments under the ministry.

From the development expenditure, the minister explained that DIS would once again take the largest share amounting to P261 414 000, which is 39 per cent of the total development budget of the ministry.

He further said the Social Protection and Disaster Preparedness Programme, which includes poverty eradication initiatives, has been allocated P198 500 000 while the ministry infrastructure has been allocated P60 300 000.

Mr Molale said the remaining 10.1 per cent of the development budget would be shared by other projects under the ministry.

These projects include establishment of the mega projects unit in the National Strategy Office, which will cost P7 million, upgrading of transmitter broadcast facilities, which has been budgeted for P15 million, implementation of Botswana Television second channel, which has been budgeted for P25 million.

“The new channel will enhance the country’s vision of a knowledge society.

Large amounts of TV content will be required to sustain the channel during its daily broadcast,” Mr Molale explained.

Presenting the budget estimates, Mr Molale explained to Parliament that his ministry was harmonising procedures for implementation of government empowerment programmes across the whole government to ensure efficient utilisation of resources.
He added that government would continue to respond timeously to changing needs of the society and adopt new methods of delivering services.

“The need to have the citizen at the centre of service delivery cannot be over-emphasised.

We are therefore going to re-evaluate the type and purpose of services currently provided and delivered as part of the improvement plan,” he said.

Concerning the Economic Stimulus Programme projects, the minister stated that 89 per cent of the planned projects across 11 ESP implementing ministries had started by December last year and some of them were already completed.

“The cumulative number of jobs created across the ministries is 24 137,  98 per cent of which are citizens and over 45 per cent are youth.

The stimulus effect of the programme has mainly been felt in the construction sector, where the local industry was providing inputs in infrastructure development,” he said.

On poverty eradication, he said a recent survey by Statistics Botswana indicated that the proportion of people living below the Poverty Datum line had declined from 19.3 per cent in 2010 to 16.3 per cent in 2016.

He further said abject poverty also declined from 6.4 per cent to 3.3 per cent during the same period.

“There can be no doubt that the delivery of Poverty Eradication packages has improved the quality of life for many beneficiaries,” he said.

Gaborone North MP, Mr Haskins Nkaigwa opposed the budget proposal on the grounds that DIS had been allocated a lot of money while its spending had not been audited.

Instead, the legislator said the DCEC allocation should be increased to capacitate it to fight corruption which he said had increased in Botswana.

He also said poverty eradication programmes were failing to yield positive outcomes because they were not being implemented correctly.

Letlhakeng - Lephepe MP, Mr Liakat Kably however said the poverty eradication projects had helped people in his constituency, stave off hunger.

He thanked the ministry for the support it was giving to people with disabilities.

However, the legislator complained about absence of ESP projects in his constituency.

He said they were promised construction of additional classrooms, toilets and teachers houses in several schools in his constituency, but those development had not yet started.

Bobonong MP, Mr Shaw Kgathi urged the minister to find ways of increasing productivity in the public service.

He further said the NSO should start doing more to assist government with strategies, which would help the country to plan the future.  ENDS