27 Jan 2020

The Assistant Minister of Youth Empowerment and Sports Development Mr Billy Buti says due to shortage of doctors government is considering engaging private practitioners to fill the gap.

Addressing residents of Area S and Ntshe Ward in Francistown West Constituency, Mr Buti who is also the Member of Parliament for Francistown East further said it was the duty of the nurses to look for drugs elsewhere when their clinics had no drugs instead of patients going around looking for them in other clinics.

Mr Buti also told residents that washing machines at Nyangabgwe Referral hospital had broken down hence the hospital was being assisted from Selide Phikwe.

He said Nyangabgwe hospital experienced shortage of blankets and sheets because the hospital was using the laundry machine that was at Selebi Phikwe.

He said that the Selibe Phikwe facility was overwhelmed as it catered for Bobirwa and other hospitals in the central region.

On education, Mr Buti said teachers, parents and students should form a united force for the success of education, adding that deserving teachers should be promoted to enhance performance.  He said those seeking transfers be allowed to go because unnecessary refusal could lead to teachers not performing well.

Mr Buti further suggested that the duties of directors be decentralised and moved to districts.  He said the government had decided to consider drought as a permanent issue that would need to be included in annual budgets.

Regarding the Youth Development Fund (YDF), he said government had identified some gaps that would have to be rectified in order to improve the lives of the youth.

“Youth say that the regulations and forms are not user friendly,” he said, adding that the request was that the fund be extended to the youth who were working.

For their part, residents said there were no plots where the youth could start their businesses.

Residents complained that it was not only shortage of blankets at Nyangabgwe hospital as those available were old, tattered and also curtains that separate hospital beds and patients were old or not enough.

Ward Development Committee (WDC) Chairperson for Area S and Ntshe Ward Ms Emma Moatswi said that the project for multipurpose hall which was started in 2017/18 had now stagnated. Ms Moatswi said the daycare center and building of other classes were completed but the WDC rejected construction of the wall for the multipurpose hall as it was not according to specifications.