19 Oct 2022

Chobe Land Board will soon have zero plot waiting lists in half of its villages within its jurisdiction.

Addressing a press conference on Monday, Chobe Land Board chairperson, Mr Johane Chenjekwa said so far the board had zero waiting lists in Satau and Parakarungu.

He said after the anticipated land allocation in Kavimba and Kachikau this week, the two villages would add to the areas with zero waiting list.

Mr Chenjekwa expressed hope that other villages in the district such as Pandamatenga, Mabele, Lesoma and Kazungula would have waiting lists cleared in the near future.

He explained that Lesoma was a pressure area, but the land board had since engaged the Ministry of Land and Water Affairs on the issue.

Mr Chenjekwa said while the land board was awaiting the outcome of the ministry engagement, it was in the meantime working hard to generate plots from the open spaces and in-fills. 

He said the Lesoma plot application waiting was at over 7 000.

He said in Satau there were 694 plots readily available for allocation, while after this week’s allocations, Kavimba and Kachikau would have 373 and 677 readily available plots respectively.

Mr Chenjekwa, who is also the president of the Botswana Association of Tribal Land Authorities (BATLA), said he was elated that other land boards such as Kgalagadi and Ghanzi also had zero waiting lists in some areas of their territories.

He said addressing plot allocation waiting lists would help land boards avoid the long land allocation waiting periods and would also help them prepare for those who recently attained 18 years and became eligible for allocation.

He appealed to Batswana to desist from making land applications in all land boards, but instead apply to their most preferred areas so that land boards could plan better for their waiting lists.

Mr Chenjekwa further encouraged all Batswana, particularly the youth, to apply for plots in Kavimba, Satau and Kachikau as tland was readily available.

He, however, said Batswana should be mindful of the fact that with the current Land Act a person qualified for only one residential plot in one of the tribal territories in the country.

Regarding the production of the Secure Land Titles (SLT), Mr Chenjekwa said the Chobe Land Board had a target of producing 6 269 this current financial year against the national target of 49 600.

He said the board started lodging STLs for registration at the Deeds Office on October 10 and as at October 14, 40 STLs were lodged.

He urged the public to continue registering their plots and that his land board had registered 6 973 plots against a total of 18 452 prospective registrations in the district.

Mr Chenjekwa explained that the Re-enacted Land Act provided that registration would take place for a period of six months effective April 20.

He said the period would elapse on October 20 and it would be upon the Ministry of Lands and Water Affairs to decide whether the penalties for failure to adhere to the provision should be taken against defaulters or not. BOPA