31 Jul 2013

Kgosi Kegobonye Maruping of Moshaweng has expressed gratitude at civil servants' constant visit to his village.

In an interview, Kgosi Maruping said it used to be a taboo for government officers to visit small villages such as Moshaweng.

However, he said in recent times he had seen the attitude improving, something that he said should be commended. “Such visits are welcome because they help the village leadership to share challenges with the civil servants, and it also helps improve services in the village,” he said.

Meanwhile, Kgosi Maruping expressed concern on the level of maintenance of the gravel road that connects his village with Molepolole, saying the grading was done once in a long time and usually of a substandard quality and degenerated soon after the work was done.

He said if the road was graded to good quality, it would help soothe their long held desire to have the two villages connected by a tarmac road. “We have actually long requested that the road be upgraded to bitumen standard, but lack of funds has been cited as the major hindrance and we were informed that in the meantime the road will be graded,” he said.

He said their request to have the road graded emanated from the fact that it was a shorter route that connected Kanye and the mining town of Jwaneng. The total distance from Kanye to Jwaneng through Moshaweng is around 100 km.

In other issues, Kgosi Maruping appreciated construction of a kgotla shelter in his village which he said was expected to be completed soon.

He also appreciated the addressing of the leadership problem at the local primary school, which he said has been operating for a long time without a school head until recently.

That, he said, hampered the school’s smooth operation and overall performance. He however, said the head-teacher’s office needed to be extended because it was small.

Kgosi Maruping also implored authorities to consider a permanent court clerk for his village, adding he was currently assisted by a court clerk from the nearby Monwane. “This hampers the smooth disposal of cases, and Moshaweng is a big village that should have g its own court clerk. We keep on postponing cases because there is no one to record the proceedings,’’ he said.

The Village Development Committee (VDC) chairman, Mr Onyaditse Ramota complained about lack of transport for the police, saying that hindered prevention of criminal activities such as stock theft which he argued was high in the area.

Mr Ramota said at the moment they sourced vehicles from Molepolole when the need arise, which is a long distance especially in times of emergencies. ENDS