26 Feb 2020

The Director of Business Development at Botswana Railways (BR), Mr Stephen Makuke says the passenger train service is not profitable.

Mr Makuke told the BR board of inquiry in Mahalapye on Tuesday that the passenger train was a social responsibility initiative and according to their research, in most countries, passenger train service was subsidized by the government in order to keep running.

He said government intervention and assistance was needed at BR, revealing that they were making a loss the last two years, due to the upgrade of a railway line in South Africa, where most BR traffic goes. He said BR had reduced its stoppage stations for the passenger train in a bid to reduce associated costs.

He however, revealed that the commuter train, which operates from Lobatse to Gaborone uses a mainliner locomotive, rather than the commuter one, which was also costing the business, because the mainliner locomotive consumes heavily.

Mr Makuke said even though the organisation was not doing well, there was ‘opportunity for BR to grow’, because of the real estate, whose asset base currently stands at P4.5 billion.

He further said there was need for the organisation to re-build the public trust it has since lost, adding that customer service should be improved. 

He also told the inquiry that currently BR did not have a railway liability insurance, hence passengers who were affected during the December 10 accident, were paid from the operational fund, which has since been depleted.

Mr Makuke said that there was a serious communication gap in BR operations, which should be rectified.

Meanwhile, the board said BR was wasteful and if the status quo remains, then the organisation would continually suffer millions of Pula in losses. ENDS