09 Dec 2021

Poverty, inequality and under-employment continue to characterise the lives of many citizens, despite Botswana’s upper middle-income status, Selebi Phikwe West MP, Mr Dithapelo Keorapetse has said .

In his debate of the State-of-the-Nation Address (SONA) on Wednesday, Mr Keorapetse said the true state of the nation was reflected in its unprecedented levels of poverty.

He said many Batswana could not afford basic necessities like shelter, food and clothing.

Mr Keorapetse said poverty had taken a new characteristic of the working poor, saying many of the country’s workers were poor because of slave wages and the refusal by government to introduce a living wage.

He noted further that many graduates were under-employed as they currently worked as interns, security guards, petrol attendants and house helpers, where they earned low wages.

He said due to the low minimum wage set by government, even companies capable of paying better chose not to do so.

Mr Keorapetse said according to analysts’ expectations, unemployment in Botswana was expected to reach 24 per cent by the end of the year.

He added that Statistics Botswana’s multi-topic survey labour force report for the first quarter of 2020 showed that the country had a labour force of just over 978 000 people out of which only 76.8 per cent was employed, leaving around 226 000 without jobs.

Of the total figure of the unemployed, Mr Keorapetse said the youth were the hardest-hit.

On sport and the performing arts, Mr Keorapetse called for the corporate world to render decent support towards the growth and sustainability of sport.

He also called on government to give incentives to companies that would respond to the call to meaningfully contribute to sport.

He criticised what he termed a tendency by big multi-national companies to contribute paltry amounts to sport and in turn gain huge mileage at almost no cost while raking in millions in profits.

He said it was necessary that such bad corporate attitude be dealt with.

Making his contribution to the debate, Gaborone Central Member of Parliament, Mr Tumisang Mangwegape-Healy thanked President Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi for having laid before the nation a robust and well put-together speech that set a tone regarding what it would take to propel the country forward.

Mr Mangwegape-Healy said it was pleasing to note that government appeared to have finally found its footing in terms of controlling the COVID-19 pandemic as evidenced by the decline in the number of deaths attributable to the disease.

The MP said as guided by the Reset Agenda, top priority of which was to save the lives of Batswana, the country was doing remarkably well under the leadership of President Masisi.

He said worth noting was that Botswana was of late consistently receiving large consignments of COVID-19 vaccines, a development that he said had allowed it to be among those leading in the vaccination of its population.

Aside from COVID-19, the legislator said the country’s challenges such as unemployment, inequality and corruption, continued to hinder progress.

Nonetheless, he said it was encouraging that President Masisi had shown concern for the challenges and had since put in place interventions to address them.

Mr Mangwegape-Healy further said it was expected that with the Reset Agenda positive changes would be recorded and the nation would pull together in the same direction.

He said this called for increased vigilance which prioritised efficiency across government and the public sector.

Additionally, he said with the impending constitutional review, the nation should ensure the strengthening of public institutions.

On the participation of citizens in the economy, Mr Mangwegape-Healy labeled the passing of the Economic Inclusion Bill in the winter sitting of Parliament a good start. He said it was important to bring Batswana into the mainstream economy.

Regarding his constituency, he said it was disappointing that to date, Gaborone Central and the city as a whole was still grappling with issues such as poor storm water drainage, bad roads and the lack of street lighting in some parts of the city.

The MP also appealed for a policy through which open spaces in the constituency could be managed and used as a tool for the economic empowerment of residents. Such spaces could be used to offset the high cost of rentals that small businesses incurred, he said. ENDS