24 Jul 2013

The South East District Council has not been able to provide all the required stationery to schools under its care due to budgetary constraints.

The council chairperson, Mr Thekiso Sorinyane said this during a full council session on Monday. He said the council was unable to provide the service due to budgetary constraints, adding that they were allocated P372 500 for stationary during the 2013/14 financial year.

“If each student was to get P180 worth of stationery then a total of P1, 576 808 would be needed to cater for such,” he said. Mr Sorinyane said such a scenario indicated that the budget was insufficient. He however pointed out that the council would continue to utilise the limited budget to at least supply students with basic stationery.

He said for schools under the central government, the procurement of text books was well underway. Schools had submitted their requirements for 2014 and the region had submitted its estimates to the Ministry of Education and Skills Development for assessment.

Furthermore, he said the ministry continued to supply primary schools with photocopiers, fax machines, fridges and laptops to be used by school heads. The council chairperson said in an effort to address the problem of staff accommodation in secondary schools, 40 houses would be built in the sub-region during the 2013/14 financial year.

“Twenty houses will be built at Matlala JSS in Tlokweng and another 20 at Baratani JSS in Otse,” he added. Mr Sorinyane said this would be a relief as the shortage of accommodation for teachers had been a burning issue not only in the district.

“Provision of houses to the teaching staff is expected to improve service delivery in the long run as they will now have a conducive living environment,” he said.

He said the out of school education programme was improving the lives of Batswana in the South East District, particularly on skills training to enable learners to venture into small business that could enable them earn a living.

He said in Ramotswa and told the council that the council was faced with the compaction of waste at the landfill since the breakdown of the council compactor. He said the company had engaged a company to carry out the repair of the machine and they are hopeful that the operations would be back to normal.

Mr Sorinyane said the district continued to support the youth empowerment initiatives through awarding tenders to provide services to youth companies that met the requirements. ENDS