26 Aug 2020

The government should in reviewing the  National Development Plan 11 (NDP 11) redirect resources to areas that are poverty stricken to ensure that Batswana evenly benefit from national wealth.

This was the submission of Bobonong MP, Mr Taolo Lucas while debating the NDP 11 Mid-Term Review at the National Assembly on Tuesday.

Mr Lucas said that apart from the high incidence of poverty countrywide and the huge disparities between the rich and the poor, research had shown that there were certain areas  that were more poverty stricken.

He said a Statistics Botswana report had cited five areas; Kweneng West, Ngwaketse West, Kgalagadi South, Ghanzi and Ngamiland West as having the highest incidences of poverty in the country. Mr Lucas said he was disappointed that there had not been any proposal through NDP 11 to address the plight of these areas.

Mr Lucas said the number of people living below the poverty datum line in those areas ranged between a third (Ngamiland West) and half of the population (Kweneng West) as against the national average of 16.3 per cent. Sustainable development projects were thus necessary there as well as in other parts of the country, to relieve Batswana of extreme poverty, he said.

He also expressed concern about the rich-poor divide, stating that research had shown that the richest one percent of Botswana’s population controlled 22.6 percent of national wealth, while the richest 10 percent owned 58 percent of the country’s wealth.

Mr Lucas called for increased taxation of the rich in order for government to generate revenue at a point in time where the country’s economic mainstay, diamonds and the tourism sector were struggling with sales.

Mr Lucas lamented that the governing Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) had a tendency of protecting the wealthy and instead placing the burden of cost recovery measures on the poor, through raised water and electricity tarrifs.

Mr Lucas also said access to land was a challenge, with a recent submission to the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) having revealed that 620 000 Batswana were awaiting land allocation, and some had to wait for up to 30 years to get a plot.

For his part, Ghanzi South MP, Mr Motsamai Motsamai complained that although Botswana was a beef producing country, cattle farmers were at the mercy of corporations they sell meat to for the pricing.

He said there was a need to improve the country’s health care system, stating as an example that a village such as Charles Hill in his constituency should have a primary hospital, that would feed a district hospital in Ghanzi, then a referral hospital in Maun.

Mr Motsamai noted that people in the Western part of the country needed to travel the long distance to the Greater Gaborone area for their medication and associated services.

Mr Motsamai said he supported calls to ensure that Botswana becomes self-sufficient in basic goods and services by pursuing import substitution industries, irrigation-based agriculture and boosting water, electricity and fuel sources.

He said this had been the position of the opposition all along as contained in their policy documents such as the Phamphlet No 1 and the Social Democratic Programme.Supporting the proposed amendments, Tati East MP, Mr Simon Moabi said the NDP 11 review would ensure the transformation of the economy and would also serve to ease the burden of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mr Moabi said the government had, through the Special Economic Zones approach committed to diversifying the economy and creating jobs. He cited the example that Pandamatenga had the opportunity to feed the country as an agricultural hub, while the proposed Lobatse Leather Park would use ox hides to create a leather industry that could export produce.

He further said the Palapye area would also benefit from downstream activities from ore extracted at Morupule Colliery, while Francistown would be a mining and logistics hub. ENDS