17 Oct 2013

Chairperson of the Central District Council, Mr Lesego Raditanka says the success of poverty eradication campaign hinges on the inclusion of rural communities both at policy formulation and implementation stages.

Speaking at the launch of poverty eradication project initiated by deputy district commissioner for Boteti, Mr Loeto Porati in Xere on October 16, Mr Raditanka indicated that government policies and programmes aimed at fighting poverty must be well aligned to address challenges of communities in less developed settlements.

He said communities in less developed settlements missed out on life empowerment opportunities and therefore civil servants must do all they could to ensure that they were not left behind.

Mr Raditanka who also appreciated the initiative pointed out that it would go a long way in addressing challenges facing communities in less developed settlements. “There is no doubt that poverty has negative consequences as it affects one mentally and even physically,” he said.

 Mr Raditanka said there were some unfortunate situations where some individuals fell into poverty as a result on ill-health, lack of education while others were victims of road accidents.  He said even though Botswana was one of Africa’s fastest growing economies, the proportion of the population that was that poor had been rising significantly.

“Today it is estimated that well over 49 per cent of the population is poor,” he said. Mr Raditanka said in light of the current situation, poverty eradication had become a major area of focus on government policies and programmes.

Mr Raditanka said destitution in the affected settlements that would be covered by the deputy district commissioner’s initiative of Xere, Khwee, Kedia, Mokubilo and Mmeya have a total of 363 destitute persons and 374 orphans.

Mr Porati said the programme was made successful by financial support from the business community in Boteti who had contributed P64 000. He said the intention was to raise P100 000 annually for a period of five years and use the funds to establish life upliftment projects for communities in less developed settlements.

Mr Porati said the poverty eradication programme targeted out of school and unemployed youth, who would be provided with five goats each to help improve their lives. He said a total of 18 youth had benefited under Phase One of the poverty eradication initiative.  Mr Porati said the initiative would also benefit six elderly people and five orphans.

“With the support of the business community through funding, we have managed to purchase 90 goats and 55 chickens for the beneficiaries.” Mr Porati said the initiative had further received a boost from his wife, who had donated P2 500 to buy 50 chickens that would be shared among Village Extension Committees (VET) of the five settlements.

Mr Porati had appreciated the support from the business community and also appealed to beneficiaries to take good care of their livestock and poultry as the intention was to better their lives. Speaking on behalf of the business that had extended a helping hand, the Chairperson of BOCCIM for Boteti region, Mr Anthony Dancho has hailed the initiative as relevant to eradicating prevailing poverty.

He said as a business community they did care and would do all in their power to ensure that Vision 2016 ideals were realised. He said poverty was a challenge to development of any nation and therefore need collaborated efforts to be fought. ENDS