10 Dec 2020

Minister of Nationality, Immigration and Gender Affairs, Ms Annah Mokgethi says currently three civil society organisations receive subventions from the government.

When answering questions in Parliament, Ms Mokgethi indicated that the organisations included Botswana Gender Based Violence and Support Centre (BGVC) formerly known as Kagisano Women’s Shelter, which has centres in Gaborone and Francistown.

Others are Women Against Rape (WAR) in Maun and the Non-Governmental Organisations (NGO) Council, which supports other civil organisations.

The minister said BGVC and WAR provided shelter for gender-based violence victims and survivors through psycho-social support and income generating activities.

The NGO Council, she said, was responsible for coordinating civil society in Botswana.

She highlighted that the 2 shelters and NGO Council had women’s human rights as their core mandate, hence offered services specific to women to facilitate full enjoyment of their rights.

Ms Mokgethi said BGVC started receiving subventions from government in 2011, whereas WAR started in 2014.

Furthermore, she noted that her ministry granted BGVC P500 000 and WAR P250 000 for the financial year 2018/2019, which represented 16.7 and 8.3 per cent respectively.

In the financial year 2019/2020, she said BGVC was granted P514 889 representing 16.8 per cent and WAR was granted P250 000, which represented 8.3 per cent of their budget.

She indicated that on whether there were plans to add any other organisations to the three, she stated that her ministry was currently conducting a study to establish and strength gender- based violence safe havens in the country, which was due for completion in March 2021.

The study, she said, would give precise and concrete information on strengthening and establishing safe havens, which would inform targeted interventions for GBV survivors, including their protection.

The minister explained that this would further inform the ministry if there would be any need to include more organisations.

Ms Mokgethi pointed out that COVID-19 pandemic saw an increase in the demand for shelter services by survivors of GBV, which put pressure on the need to expand services by both shelters and other key stakeholders.

She said it was, therefore, desirous to increase subventions to these organisations when funds permitted as they played a crucial role in addressing GBV.

Specially elected Member of Parliament, Dr Unity Dow had wanted to know the names of civil society organisations receiving subventions from government and those that had women’s human rights as a core mandate as well as when they started receiving subventions.

She also asked the minister to state the amount granted to each for the financial years 2018/19 and 2019/20 and whether there were any plans to add any other organisation to the list.

Dr Dow was also interested to know whether there were plans to increase current subventions for organisations focusing on gender- based violence work. Ends