23 Jun 2022

Eleven villages in the Kgalagadi District are earmarked for allocation of 2 360 residential plot during 2022/2023 financial year.   

This is in line with government set target of facilitating allocation of at least 100 000 residential plots to Batswana by the end of March 2023.

Speaking during Kgalagadi District Full Council meeting on Tuesday, council chairperson, Mr Hendrick Jacobs said the council was in the process of preparing layout plans for the 11 villages which included; Tsabong, Werda, Middlepits, Bokspits, Gakhibane, Bogogobo, Kolonkwaneng, Bray, Kisa, Zutshwa and Ngwatle.

Mr Jacobs said as it was the norm, during layout plans preparations, a series of consultations would be held with village leadership, communities and other interested parties in the aforementioned villages, hence the need for communities to get ready.

He admitted that one of the challenges that caused allocation backlog was that during financial year 2021/22 the council could not deliver layout plans due to lack of AutoCAD, a computer software that enables planners to design plans.

The council managed to source funds to procure the software and has been installed.

Meanwhile, he said Kgalagadi Land Board (KGLB) had started land allocations for the current financial year.

As at May 2022 in the first quarter, a total of 248 allocations had been made and KGLB has set a target of carrying out new allocations of least 3 200 plots to address the existing backlog of waiting lists.

Mr Jacobs said the original Tribal Land Act of 1968, which was last reviewed in 1993 to, among others, make it tribally neutral, has now been re-enacted by Parliament and was approved in 2018, but only came into effect in April 2022.

This development, he said implied that there were significant changes from the original Act, of which officers were on the ground sensitising communities on the changes.

Currently, he said the Ministry of Land Management, Water and Sanitation Services was making headway with preparations for issuance of new secure land titles to all citizens who had been allocated plots under Tribal Land.

This, he said, was the final component of the land registration process commonly referred to as LAPCAS, which started some years ago.

To ensure smooth implementation, he said KGLB was in the process of collecting missing documents needed for facilitation of this exercise such as affidavit of birth, marital status records, and related necessary information from plot holders.

He expressed concern that plot holders were not forth coming to update their land records and submit the requested documents.

Thus he encouraged plot owners to come forward and assist the land board to complete the LAPCAS exercise.

Kgalagadi District has approximately 35 000 plot holders. ENDS