25 Sep 2013

A clean city is an attraction to investors, Francistown mayor, Mr James Kgalajwe has said.

Speaking during the city’s three-day clean-up campaign, which started in Area W, he said the vision of the city was to become an investment area by 2022. Councillor Kgalajwe said the clean-up campaigns would help the city prepare for the development and investment Pitso in the city in November. The mayor noted that the Pitso would see international investors visit the city to identify sectors for investment.

He said no one would like to invest in a filthy environment and keeping Francistown clean was a way to encourage investors. On other issues, he explained that before the pitso, the city would have two more clean-up campaigns which would involve students. Mr Kgalajwe added that the other objective of the campaign was to ensure that the city became one of the cleanest cities in Southern Africa.

Furthermore, he said a clean environment encouraged good health and reduced the likelihood of airborne and waterborne diseases.

For his part, principal district development officer, Mr Boyce Mangole said the clean-up campaign was intended to improve the image of the city. “Clean up campaigns are important as they teach residents that cleanness is necessary and an environmental issue to be taken into consideration, ” he said.

He noted that a dirty city would not only affect human beings through spread of contagious diseases such as dihorrhea, but would also affect their animals. He explained that if cattle and goats ate plastic bags left lying around they were likely to die from plastic ingestion which had no cure. ENDS