12 Jan 2014

The Vice President, Dr Ponatshego Kedikilwe has called on parents to help government in developing the youth.

Dr Kedikilwe, who is also MP for Mmadinare, made the call when addressing a kgotla meeting in Foley on January 9. He said parents and communities as a whole should ensure that their children enrolled in pre-school, primary, secondary and tertiary education so as to be comparable to other youth in the global community.

He said parents and teachers should collaborate to safeguard and improve the education of children and instill in them the norms and morals of society.

He expressed concern at the rate of teenage pregnancy saying some youth were unable to complete their education. This problem, he said, should be addressed urgently.

The Vice President said government was committed to empowering the youth and cited the Ministry of Education and Skills Development, which he said had been allocated about P9 billion to educate and empower the youth. He said through the Back to School programme, 33 000 youth had been re- absorbed into the education system from primary to tertiary education.

He also noted that the education ministry in collaboration with the Chamber of Mines was prioritising vocational training in the mining and energy sectors to address skills mismatch by engaging youth in training in areas such as electronics, earthmoving, fabrication and welding,  fitting, heavy duty mechanics, instrumentation and mining engineering, among others.

Dr Kedikilwe stated that about 100 youth had been enrolled at Botswana College of Engineering and Technology in Gaborone and at Francistown College of Vocational Training.

He said the leadership had also come up with several approaches and interventions to address under-employment and to create opportunities for youth and skills transfer such as the National Youth Internship programme, Youth Empowerment scheme and Youth Development Fund. He said the Youth Development Fund had been increased from P60 million to P120 million.

He explained that 127 youth had been engaged under the two departments of information and broadcasting as freelance journalists and photo journalists where P732 000 had so far been utilised.

Meanwhile during his tour of the constituency, the Vice President visited the Dikgatlhong Dam at Robelela which has a capacity of 400million cubic metres of water and the Letsibogo Dam which has a water holding capacity of 100 million cubic metres.

Currently Dikgatlhong Dam has 160 million cubic metres while the Letsibogo Dam located in Mmadinare is 78 per cent full. ENDS