26 Feb 2014

Thirty young people have been funded under the Youth Development Fund at the cost of over P2 million, says the Minister of Youth, Sports and Culture, Mr Shaw Kgathi.

Answering a question in Parliament on Tuesday, Mr Kgathi said out of this number, 12 benefited during the current financial year.

The number of those who participated in the constituency tournaments increased from 228 in 2011 to 1 080 during the third cycle of 2013/14 which ended on February 23, this year, he said.

The minister said a total of 21 young people from the Gaborone West South constituency attended the boot camps and were currently attached to various government departments.

He said 12 young people attended the Youth Development Fund focused boot camp while137 young people attended the business awareness creation workshop.

Mr Kgathi told the house that 15 groups participated in the constituency art competition during the first cycle of 2013/14 and 12 during second cycle which ended in November 2013, and winners paid price money amounting to P79 700.

Unfortunately, the minister said, statistics for other programmes had not been disaggregated per constituency and as such he could not state how many were from Gaborone West South Constituency.

Furthermore, he said as at January 2014, young people who had benefited from programmes under the Young Empowerment Scheme (YES) were 33 044 enrolled in the Back to School programme, while 3 299 attended boot camps out of which 2 539 have since been attached to various institutions. 360 have been enrolled at Boitekanelo College to train as paramedics and public health educators, he added.

Mr Kgathi said 444 attended youth empowerment festivals while 434 attended YES ability camps for youth with disabilities, while 68 422 participated in the constituency sport tournament whereas 17 902 participated in the constituency art competitions.

He said 3 935 benefited from Youth Development Fund at the cost of P361 million  while 129 young people benefited from the Ministry of Infrastructure Science and Technology tenders amounting to P55 million.

Parliament heard that 127 youth freelancers benefited from Department of Broadcasting and were paid P723 114 and a total of 6 584 young people have been allocated land for various use.

MP for Gaborone West South, Mr Botsalo Ntuane had asked the minister to state the number of youth that have benefited from YES and youth that were assisted in the Gaborone West South constituency. ENDS