14 Feb 2023

Minister of Defence and Security, Mr Kagiso Mmusi has told Parliament that all police officers have been trained in handling cases in general social ills such as child abuse, gender based violence (GBV), rape, murder and drugs.

Minister Mmusi said this in response to a parliamentary question on Monday.

“There are specific branches dealing with those social ills and all officers deployed in the said branches have been given further training on their respective areas.

Having noted that GBV related offences such as defilement, child abuse, rape and murder are a cause for concern in the country, Botswana Police Service (BPS) took an initiative to further capacitate all the station commanders and post commanders to adequately handle such cases,” the minister said.

He indicated that common cases that were mostly reported in the Gaborone West cluster included rape, defilement and threat to kill.

He said in all police stations across the country, provision for human resource as well as motor vehicle fleet were not adequate.

He added that they would, however, continue to increase resources for police stations including Gaborone West.

Parliament also heard that out of 17 perpetrators arrested since 2018 in relation to the social ills, 11 had been granted bail.

“For the past five years, Gaborone West recorded four cases of rape perpetrated by repeat offenders,” said Mr Mmusi.

Further, the minister indicated that strategies were in place to curb lawlessness in the cluster in order to maintain peace and security in Gaborone included deployment of resources at targeted, hard hit crime prone areas, the use of surveillance camera in strategic areas, conducting stop, question and search strategy as well as enhancing police strength through community policing.

Member of Parliament for Gaborone Bonnington South, Mr Christian Greeff had asked the minister to state the number of police officers who had been trained to handle cases of child abuse, GBV, rape, murder and drug abuse.

MP Greeff also wanted to know if the ministry was satisfied with the resources, including staffing at Gaborone West Police Station to help the officers deal with the reported cases timeously.

Furthermore, he wanted to know the number of perpetrators that had since been granted bail and if there were strategies to curb lawlessness in order to maintain peace and security in the capital city. ENDS