20 Nov 2013

The permanent secretary in the Ministry of Education and Skills Development, Ms Grace Muzila says government is committed to development of education, a journey which should be supported and embraced.

Speaking during the graduation ceremony of 118 Botswana Accountancy College (BAC) students, Ms Muzila said government had made a deliberate move to embark on education which suited the needs of the country’s market and train for the world market.

Ms Muzila noted that the journey, which was not only a challenge to the government should be supported by all so that the country’s economic needs were met, hence creation of jobs for graduates which for a long time had been putting pressure on government for sustainable jobs.

She said at the moment, government had come up with short, medium and long time economic interventions through various schemes offered to Batswana at all levels. The permanent secretary said the main focus was to create sustainable jobs which would make the country self-reliant in many spheres of economy and on the other hand export qualified and skilled personnel, an ideal relentlessly pursued by the education hub.

Furthermore, Ms Muzila said she was optimistic that the current graduates would add value in the diversification of the economy, noting that areas which need special attention in this regard include among others tourism, agriculture and mining, which have the potential to employ and absorb many graduates and other citizens.


Human resource development, she said, was the greatest academic tool that could ever be produced for the country for development and as such implored on graduates to continue researching and advancing more technology which could be used for the benefit of the nation and the rest of the world.

Ms Muzila also challenged them to venture into agricultural sector to feed the nation and export surplus to the rest of the world. Speaking at the same occasion, BAC executive director Mr Michael Lesolle said, “this is indeed a significant moment for many of our students.Witnessing the achievement of these young and ambitious students is a moment of great pride and a sense of true achievement for having taken the first great step in the pursuit of life-long education”.

For his part, the Dean for Faculty of Applied Sciences, Professor John MacIntyre said, “against the background of the rapidly growing economic intent on ensuring a nation of informed and educated Batswana, a tertiary education is increasingly proving to be a necessity in the world today".

The graduates of this year’s BSc Computing and Information Systems (CIS) class of 2013, had empowered themselves to leave a greater impact within Botswana’s economy, and Prof Macintyre expressed confidence that the skills and lessons they had been taught, during their time at BAC will guide them well.

The 118 graduates were from BSc CEs (Computer Systems Engineering) programme and BSc Applied Computing. Top achievers were Harried Masilo and Oratile Gabasianelwe from ABC course and Kushatha Selebeng and Tshepo Seronamang from CSE department. ENDS