17 Aug 2025

Parliament has passed the Digital Services Bill, 2025 and Cybersecurity Bill 2025 that were presented before Parliament by the Minister of Communications and Innovation, Mr David Tshere.

Mr Tshere presented both Bills before Parliament under a certificate of urgency on August 14 and said Botswana was in the digitalisation journey, hence the need for Parliament to urgently pass a legislative framework that would enable digitalisation in the country.

The objective of the Digital Services Bill, he said, was to accelerate the country’s transformation agenda by addressing challenges in developing a legislative framework that would enable digitalisation.

Minister Tshere said the Bill was also intended to drive the universal access, innovation and economic growth to strengthen security and the trust of online services and customer protection.

Once enacted, he said the Bill would establish the Digital Services Authority and enhance the management and promotion of digital services and processes.

Mr Tshere said the authority would serve as a body responsible for formulation of digital services standards and provide for its functions to ensure a safer digital space.

Furthermore, when motivating the urgency of the Cybersecurity Bill, the minister said there was need for the creation of a legal framework to deal and tackle the cyber threats that the country was faced with, almost on a daily basis.

“We need to protect our critical information and the critical national infrastructure by establishing the national cyber security structures that will deal with and arrest any of those threats that come to us in line with the national and global standards,” he stressed.

Besides being a compliance issue, he said it was critical for Botswana to have a Cybersecurity Bill, adding that the country had been left behind, making it vulnerable in terms of cyber attacks.

Once enacted, he explained that the Cybersecurity Bill would provide for the establishment of structures to promote cybersecurity and capacity building in the country.

Additionally, Minister Tshere said the Bill would also regulate and promote the development of cybersecurity activities in the country to provide for the identification and declaration of critical information infrastructures and measures to protect critical information infrastructures. ENDS