28 Nov 2023

There is need to empower female political leaders in the country in order to achieve true democracy. The appeal was made by Lentsweletau/Mmopane MP, Ms Nnaniki Makwinja during her contribution to the State-Of-the-Nation Address debate on Monday.

Ms Makwinja, who is also the Assistant Minister of Education and Skills Development said currently, women representation in Parliament was a paltry 11 per cent.

“True democracy is when there is equal representation of genders, and other nations are far ahead of us when it comes to women empowerment in political positions,” she said.

She therefore called for  resourcing of women, saying that most of those that showed interest in political positions were frustrated by lack of resources.

On other issues, Ms Makwinja expressed her concerns on issues of gender-based violence, especially rape, and said despite its small population, statistics indicated that Botswana was leading globally in cases of rape. She therefore called for strict laws to fight the scourge, including child marriages under the disguise of culture.

Concerning her constituency, Ms Makwinja said Kgope and Lentsweletau were horticultural hubs, and applauded the Ministry of Agriculture for the support in the area. “The area is making its contribution towards food security in the country, including the production of sunflower oil, animal feed and green tea,” she said.

She said the area should be prioritised as a horticultural hub, just like it was the case with the Selebi Phikwe citrus farm.

Meanwhile, Gaborone Central legislator, Mr Tumisang Mangwegape-Healy said the construction industry was one way of empowering citizens.

He urged government to ensure youth empowerment in its many construction projects, hoping the Development Manager model would also help ensure citizens inclusion.

He also talked about the need to guard against market dominance by the established companies in government’s construction projects.

Mr Mangwegape-Healy complained about what he said was lack of support of local banks by government.

“Botswana Building Society and Botswana Savings Bank are the closest we have of citizen banks, and government should support them by among others, disbursing funds through them for initiatives such as social benefits,” he said.

He said this would help break foreign monopoly.

Concerning the creative industry,the MP said the current P15 million spent on acquiring local content was too small, and should be raised to at least P100 million. He said this was because the local creative sector had the potential to create much needed employment.

Mr Magwegape-Healy also said during his tenure as MP, he managed to advocate for among others, the development of the Segoditshane River canal, the handing over of Gaborone game reserve to the community and the turning of the Gaborone Main mall into a special economic zone. ENDS