29 Jun 2022

 After eight years of hardship and gloom, Oxygas Pty Ltd, a 100 per cent citizen-owned company, has finally taken off with a multi-million Pula air separation plant in Selebi Phikwe.

The project is not only expected to create employment and resuscitate the economy of the once vibrant copper/nickel town, but will be the first of its kind in the country to manufacture oxygen and other gases for medical and industrial purposes.

Upon its commissioning early next year, the project will supply different clients in health, mining, agriculture and other sectors.

“This is a great milestone for Botswana and Selebi Phikwe in particular,” said Minister of Health, Dr Edwin Dikoloti, during the project’s recent ground breaking ceremony.

Dr Dikoloti said the project showed not only government’s commitment to the diversification of Botswana’s economy but also its readiness and willingness to facilitate the private sector to open businesses anywhere in Botswana and the region.

He said there were currently 103 projects under SPEDU facilitation out of which 27 had been awarded tax relief incentives while 29 had benefitted from the 30 per cent offtake incentive.

Oxygas, he said, was well placed to help revitalise Selebi Phikwe and the entire SPEDU region.

He said the Selebi Phikwe Citrus project, the 50 mega-watts solar power plant currently under contsruction and now Oxygas, were tangible deliverables that presented new opportunities for “our country and our people”.

Minister Dikoloti said if the facility had been conceived well before the advent of COVID-19, it would have addressed the country’s gas supply challenges.

“It is a well-known fact, especially among those in the health sector, how important medical gases are, in particular oxygen, which proved to be a threat to survival of the people at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic last July,” he said. Dr Dikoloti commended Oxygas, Citizen Entrepreneurship Development Agency (CEDA), Botswana Development Corporation (BDC), SPEDU and Botswana Chamber of Mines for collaborating on the project saying government encouraged any partnership and strived to reduce red tape.

For his part, Oxygas managing director, Mr Keamogetse Molebatsi expressed happiness that after eight years of hard work, the project had finally taken off.

The project, he said, was about the power of a collective of like-minded individuals and organisations, both in the private and public sectors.

He said Oxygas would be a one-stop medical and industrial gases centre, supplying oxygen, liquid and gaseous nitrogen as well as nitrous oxide, with an eye not only on the local but also on the regional market.

Mr Molebatsi said the project promised a stable and consistent supply of medical and industrial gases.

He further recognised SPEDU, BDC, CEDA, ECM and Selebi Phikwe Town Council for facilitating the project, which was expected to employ 200 people during the construction phase.

Selebi Phikwe West MP, Mr Dithapelo Keorapetse said it was unacceptable that that the venture took a long time to establish, lamenting that the town had lost many potential investors, primarily because of red tape and other manmade hurdles.

“When you look at our economic developmental trajectory, the most notable result is that we became an upper middle income country, but unlike South East Asian countries, industrialization remained a major challenge in our economic development,” Mr Keorapetse said.

He said manufacturing projects were a welcome development and thanked Oxygas for choosing Selebi Phikwe as its investment destination, as well as SPEDU for ensuring that the project saw the light of day.

The MP expressed the hope that SPEDU’s relocation to Botswana Investment and Trade Centre would not disrupt efforts to turn the Selebi Phikwe economy around.

He also thanked BDC and CEDA for their combined P80m contribution as all as ‘everybody who contributed to the implementation of the project’. ENDs