15 Mar 2018

Botswana Power Corporation (BPC) is committed to citizen economic empowerment throughout its value chain, Parliament was told.

Answering a question in Parliament, Minister of Mineral Resources, Green Technology and Energy Security,  Advocate Sadique Kebonang said compliance with the Citizen Empowerment Policy formed an integral part of the qualification, evaluation, award and performance monitoring criteria for BPC, North West transmission grid project.

He indicated that in accordance with the applicable citizen economic empowerment policy, the first phase of the project provided for the award and expenditure of about P1.26 billion of the value of the contract with citizen owned companies and for on-the-job development of citizen engineers and other professionals.

Advocate Kebonang said in the period of the project, 2 100 jobs would be created and about 81 per cent of all jobs would be held by citizens.

Compliance to the citizen economic empowerment requirements is monitored at all stages of the contract, he noted.

The minister further informed Parliament that there are 10 executive management positions in BPC and seven of them are held by Batswana.

Furthermore, he said BPC had  a long-term succession plan to localise expatriate positions.

Specially Elected Member of Parliament, Mr Mephato Reatile wanted to know if BPC applied the citizen economic empowerment strategy in all aspects of its value chain, with specific emphasis on the North West transmission grid project.

He also wanted to know how many Batswana companies would benefit from the said project, how many Batswana held senior management positions at BPC and if there were any efforts to localise some of the strategic positions in future. ENDS