22 Jul 2019

Over P76 million has been approved for the Ipelegeng programme in the North West District for the 2019/2020 financial year.

The funding has been divided between the two sub-districts of Okavango, which has been allocated over P36 million and Maun Administrative Authority (MAA) which received over P39 million.

District Ipelegeng coordinator, Mr Bishop Keolebetse revealed in an interview that they were now awaiting disbursement of the funds.

The district, he said, planned for 365 Ipelegeng projects to be undertaken during the financial year and that currently 350 projects had been started.

He said out of the 350 projects, 147 were being implemented in the Okavango sub district while 218 were being undertaken at MAA, including the two spill over projects.

Mr Keolebetse explained that the district planned to undertake minor construction and maintenance works as well as environmental upkeep and labour works in all the villages of the district.

He decried delays to disburse funds, saying they affected projects implementation and completion.

He announced that some labour intensive projects had started as they had decided to utilise some funds from the drought relief programme to pay wages.

Mr Keolebetse explained that the district received over P11 million for the drought relief mitigation programme, adding that they were implementing 53 projects, with 21 at mobilisation stage while 31 had started

Implementation status of the 350 Ipelegeng projects as at May 2019, he said indicated that two projects stood between 76-99 per cent, 348 between 1-25 per cent while 15 projects were at zero.

Meanwhile, the coordinator expressed concern about lack of commitment by Ipelegeng workers, admitting as well that his unit was understaffed, making supervision and monitoring of workers difficult.

He said they relied on the assistance of the Village Development Committees to drive the programme.

Mr Keolebetse urged workers to take the programme seriously to ensure it produced positive results. He noted that the programme was not a permanent job offer, but stated that the main objective was to provide short-term employment support and relief whilst at the same time carrying out essential development projects.

He implored workers to demonstrate commitment and understand that they were also contributing to the development of their villages.

Workers were also urged to work hand in hand with the government for better service delivery to the community as government spent millions on the programme.

The programme has created employment for 15 860 beneficiaries as at May 2019, 9 352 of them women and 6 508 men while youth engagement stood at 9 071. There are5 091 females and 3 980 males. ENDS