11 Aug 2022

National public broadcasters, being Radio Botswana and Botswana Television, were established with a clear public service mandate of dissemination of general news and entertainment.

Answering a question in Parliament Wednesday, Minister for State President, Mr Kabo Morwaeng said the broadcasters were established to provide platforms for publicising and creating awareness to citizens on government policies, projects, programmes and initiatives meant to benefit all Batswana.

He said government possessed a fundamental responsibility to be accountable to citizens by continuously providing them with accurate and authoritative information.

He said that responsibility was more necessary now than ever before because of the phenomenon of fake news.

“The advent of ambiguous and borderless social media makes it imperative that a responsible government provide a trusted source of information that can be accessed by all citizens, even the less privileged,” said the minister.

Mr Morwaeng explained that national public broadcasters were subjected to state control because they relied on government to finance their operations.

He added that existing services were adequate for the purpose for which they were created, such as to inform, educate and entertain the public as a whole on an equitable basis.

“In addition to the above, I am confident that Batswana are well served by the current broadcasting industry in Botswana.

The broadcasting industry was liberalised in 1999 when the first private radio stations were licensed in this country under the National Broadcasting Act. Botswana Communications Regularly Authority has now licensed a total of seven private television stations and three radio stations. All these provide a rich diversity of content and views to Batswana,” said the minister.

Mr Morwaeng further said through the infrastructure sharing arrangement, private radio stations as well as some television stations had access to transmission sites provided through the universal access service fund.

The fund, he explained, was designed to enable them to reach under serviced areas and provide diversity of content to Batswana.

He further said government through the national broadcaster was engaged in facilitating the creative industry with the view of elevating them to international standards.

“The study to identify gaps in our local creative industry has been completed. The multi-media complex auditorium at BTV is currently being refurbished and being fitted with state-of-the-art equipment,” said the minister.

Selebi Phikwe East MP, Mr Kgoberego Nkawana had asked whether the minister would consider liberalising and weaning off Botswana Television from government.  ENDs