25 Nov 2021

Research and innovation can play vital role in driving transformation in any developing country.

In his contribution to the debate on the State-of-the-Nation Address (SONA) on Wednesday, Tati East MP, Dr Douglas Letsholathebe said Botswana, like the rest of the world, should embrace these fields and tap into their potential to fuel transformation.

Dr Letsholathebe stated that coupled with technical and vocational education and training (TVET), research and innovation could propel Botswana towards its ideal of a knowledge-based economy.
Saddening however, he said was the country’s lack of faith on the work of its own researchers and innovators.

The status quo, if not reversed, he said would continue to rob the country of the great benefits that it could be reaping from its researchers and innovators.

On some of the challenges plaguing his constituency, Dr Letsholathebe said human-wildlife conflict continued to deprive his constituents engaged in crop farming of the sweat of their labour.

He said elephants had become a daily menace to farmers, destroying crops from year to year and at times completely driving them out of their ploughing fields. He said Matopi, Patayamatebele and Matshelagabedi were among the most affected villages in the constituency.

Dr Letsholathebe also attributed the bad state of the border fence between Botswana and Zimbabwe to the damage caused by elephants. He said the situation had also made the smuggling of goods and livestock in and out of the country a daily occurrence.

To mitigate the situation, Dr Letsholathebe urged government to capacitate police stations in the constituency so as to enable the police to effectively deal with crime in the area.

Still on agriculture, the MP observed that the youth were beginning to be drawn to the sector in good numbers, but that the majority was being constrained by lack of access to land from pursuing their dreams.

He said with Tati East constituency and the rest of the North East District having a shortage of land due to most of the area being taken up by ranches, government should put in place a special dispensation to address the problem in the district and in other parts of the country facing a similar predicament.

He also appealed to the youth who were fortunate to be allocated land to desist from selling it, but to rather lease it out, thereby retaining their land rights.

As for the beef and small stock industry, Dr Letsholathebe commended President Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi for his resolve to develop the two sub-sectors.

He appealed to the youth to continue leaning towards agriculture and make use of the various initiatives that had been put in place to support those undertaking different agricultural activities.

Also contributing to the SONA debate, Nkange MP, Dr Never Tshabang similarly decried the invasion of elephants into his constituency.

Dr Tshabang noted that despite repeated pleas for help, government was yet to address the problem although the situation was becoming more pronounced with each passing year.

On the beef industry, he said the Nkange constituency was in a rather hopeless situation due to a lack of market.

He argued that the state of affairs left cattle owners in the constituency in the hands of predators who often purported to source markets for farmers but in the end ripped them out of the proceeds of their livestock.

Dr Tshabang called on government to protect farmers in the area so that they too could benefit from the livestock rearing endeavours.

On the state of development projects in Nkange constituency, the legislator said the area existed under a state of deprivation as a result of delays in the implementation of certain key projects.

He cited the construction of the Maitengwe police station, a project that he said should have been implemented from 2017 to 2019, but that to date was still ongoing with little progress.

He said the Maitengwe-Tutume road was likewise behind schedule.

He said although there had been problems with the initial contractor, resulting in their termination, no information pertaining to the way-forward had been availed hence the constituency was in limbo with regards to the future of the project.

Describing the facility as an eyesore, Dr Tshabang also stated that Tutume Primary Hospital was in a sorry state due to maintenance not being done properly.

He said while government had promised the area a new hospital, nothing had come out of the promise.

On a different issue, the Member of Parliament lamented that Botswana’s minimum wage was too low to enable workers to sustain themselves.

He said with inflation shooting upwards and disposable income shrinking, workers in the lowest-paying brackets were losing hope of ever living decent lives.

Dr Tshabang condemned government for what he said was placating foreign-owned companies with cheap labour at the expense of protecting the welfare of its own people. Ends