22 Jul 2018

Mosetse residents have been cautioned against voter trafficking during next year’s general elections.

Addressing a kgotla meeting in Mosetse recently, Assistant Minister for Presidential Affairs, Governance and Public Administration, Mr Machana Shamukuni said in the past, there had been cases of voter trafficking which in some cases led to confusion and misunderstandings.

He, therefore, said Batswana should know their rights and responsibility when it came to elections.

Mr Shamukuni emphasised that at this stage and considering the different platforms used to sensitise the public on voting processes, people should be in a position to utilise their rights accordingly.

He said for the first time, government through Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) set the national registration period for two and a half months, from September 3 to November 11 this year.

He said the period was deliberately made longer because there would be no supplementary registration.

Mr Shamukuni urged Batswana to play their part in a democratic government by choosing a nominee suiting their criteria of a good representative.

He said the Ministry of Nationality, Immigration and Gender Affairs had secured new machines to push backlog of new and renewals of national identity cards.

He however, raised a concern that many IDs remained uncollected.

On other issues, he said they have been mandated as government leadership to sensitise Batswana on corruption, adding that corruption had been identified as a major factor which affected service delivery hence Batswana were encouraged to report corruption.

He said government introduced Whistle Blowing Act and therefore people should be comfortable to report corrupt practices at any given time without fear. ENDS