24 Jan 2019

 A Chobe District official has enumerated challenges perculiar to the area which are negatively impacting on its development. 

  Presentating during the review of the District Development Plan 8 on January 22, Chobe principal district officer-development Ms Nobuhle Mbusi said human/wildlife and land use conflicts, unemployment, undiversified economy, limited ICT access and insufficient power especially at Pandamatenga had been identified as peculiar to the district.

Other challenges she mentioned included limited source of funding for dry land small scale farmers and unavailability of construction raw materials such as sand and gravel.

On the social side, Ms Mbusi said challenges such as high prevalence of HIV/AIDS and non-communicable disease, poverty among women, youth and people living with disability, gender inequality, gender based violence had been identified.

The influx of illegal immigrants, Chobe River floods and high crime rate including cross border crime were other challenges indentified.

Still other chaalenges, Ms Mbusi said, were threats posed by floods and drought exacerbated by climate change.

Ms Mbusi also cited as challenges, the degradation of the river frontage due to boat traffic congestion and that of land due to overpopulation of elephants.

For their part, representatives of various villages in the district suggested the upgrading of the Pandamatenga Kgotla shelter  and paving of the internal road to the school together with speed humps.

Another suggestion was for a fish farm in Kachikau for employment creation purposes, the provision of a water tank in Parakarungu, gravelling of 3km of internal roads in the same village and the installation of a transformer as the current one could not accommodate new connections.

In Kavimba, they proposed four LA houses for the police, street lights and the construction of a road to the local primary school while in Mabele, they proposed public officers’ accommodation and a public library.

In Satau, they requested water reticulation at the new plots and another transformer. Plateau VDC asked for a cultural village while Kazungula proposed porta cabins to replace the tents used as classrooms at the primary school.

Lesoma VDC suggested the extension of the tarred road and street lighting.

In response, Ms Mbusi said community constituency development proposals would be consolidated and presented to the District Development Committee and full council for appraisal.

Another speaker, Chobe  council chairperson, Councillor Paul Chabaesele said the land conflict issue was well known and expressed the hope that it would be addressed by the land board through a document that would be presented to council.

He said if recommendations made in the document were implemented, they would also help address the problem of humanwildlife conflict. 

Councillor Chabaesele said there was too much interest un the tourism sector and urged residents to venture into manufacturing by utilising Pandamatenga Farms produce.

He said government was aware of land degradation in Chobe and as a result, the anticipated Agro-Zambezi, the Kazungula railway line and the power lines from Phokoje Power Station in Selebie-Phikwe would be done with minimal environmental impact.

On shortage of gravel and sand, he said the council requested the land board to avail burrow pits to the VDC, but in Lesoma there were some setbacks as most of the area was a forest reserve.

He explained that in Satau and Parakarungu, the land was  not available but the Ministry of Land Management, Water and Sanitation Services was still working on the matter.

Mr Chabaesele said land had been secured for a new primary school in Kazungula with the project expected to start in July.

  He said the new school would address the problem of congestion at the existing one.ENDS