23 Jan 2013

The Botswana National Olympic Committee (BNOC) has commended British High Commissioner, Jennifer Anderson for her role in Botswana’s success at the 2012 Olympics Games.

On Tuesday, the BNOC held a farewell event to appreciate Anderson’s effort in helping the organisation to prepare for the London Olympics.

Anderson’s tenure as High Commissioner comes to an end after being in Botswana since January 2010. During that period, the BNOC and the British High Commission developed strong partnership on sport development.

"She assisted in championing the preparations and motivating support for the team,” said BNOC president, Negroes Kgosietsile during the farewell event.

Botswana tasted success for the first time at the Olympic Games when 800m athlete Nigel Amos won a silver medal . Female 400m runner, Amantle Montsho also reached the final though she failed to win a medal.

Kgosietsile appealed to the British High Commission to continue supporting sport even after Anderson’s departure. “We appeal for continued support from both Ms Anderson and the British High Commission in the future,” Kgosietsile said.

For her part, Anderson said Botswana athletes possessed amazing natural talent, hence promised to assist the country in preparing for the 2014 Commonwealth Games that would be held in Scotland.

Meanwhile, the BNOC will host the regional Zeus workshop on February 4 for the second time after hosting it last year. Zeus is a web-based database management system that enables sport organisations to manage their information systems and databases online.

The system is accessible from anywhere and requires no special equipment. It enables organisations to give athletes, coaches and administrators a platform for the management and collection of their data, such as biographical information, travel itineraries, outfitting, housing, schedules, accreditation and results.

It is currently used by many organisations throughout the world and was used extensively during the London 2012 Olympic Games. The workshop is one of the many efforts by BNOC to have the system adopted by Botswana national federations and other sport organisations to cut costs and improve efficiency in the day to day organising of events, management of information and many other benefits the software brings. BOPA