16 Mar 2020

Botswana Police Service (BPS) Divisional Commander South has advised police officers to be healthy at all times to adequately perform their duties.

Speaking at a wellness event organised by officers from the policing District No. 4 recently, Mr Harrison Digobe said officers should lead healthy lifestyle and do medical checks from time to time.

“There are deadly non-communicable diseases which are lifestyle related that we should avoid so that we stay healthy and perform our mandate actively. 

These non-communicable diseases include cancer, cardio vascular diseases and chronic lung diseases, which are related to physical inactivity and unhealthy diet,” he said.

He also encouraged them to carry out daily physical training to combat poor health.

However, he warned them to be physically fit in order to perform their mandate effectively.

“We cannot effectively perform our duties if we are not physically fit because we deal with criminals that are mobile most of the time,” he said.

The event, which included physical exercises and screening for diseases, was held under the theme; My Health My Pride 2020.

It was attended by officers from Lobatse, Woodhall, Goodhope and Ramatlabama police stations.

Officer commanding for District No. 4, Mr Paul Molapisi said they decided to stage the wellness event in order to encourage their officers to lead healthy lifestyle.

“We found it important to set aside one day to promote wellness among our employees so that they can be productive at work,” he said.

Police assistant commissioner, Ms Rebaone Rauwe told officers to treat physical training and healthy living as a lifestyle and not a one day issue.

She said they needed to be healthy in their endeavour to enforce the law.

She said statistics indicated that 46 per cent of deaths recorded in Botswana were due to non-communicable diseases such as cancer, diabetes, heart diseases and other chronic illnesses. Ends