The contentious 100, 000 jobs
Mompati Tlhankane | Sunday November 5, 2023 06:00
Masisi presented his first SONA on November 5, 2018 with an expansive agenda. But he revealed then that he had made several policy pronouncements that are primarily meant to address, as a matter of urgency, the twin problems of poverty and unemployment particularly amongst young people. Masisi, however, is still confronting the unemployment challenges as he presents his sixth SONA this Monday.
Despite the unemployment rate slightly dropping from 26% last year to 25.4% this year, many critics have often labelled Masisi’s yearly speech the usual ‘November ritual’. COVID-19 has obviously exacerbated the divide between those who are employed and those who are unemployed but Masisi’s numbers tell a different story than the reality on the ground.
49, 877 jobs created in 2018-19
Masisi indicated in the 2019 SONA that forest and range resources continued to play a significant role in rural livelihoods and poverty reduction and that it had created 9, 512 jobs that financial year. He also revealed then that during the 2018-19 financial year, a total of 2, 466 jobs were created in the manufacturing, property, services and agricultural sectors with a total investment of P466 million. That same financial year, he said the Botswana Investment and Trade Centre’s (BITC) promotion drive created 3, 981 jobs. He also announced that the poverty eradication programme operating projects had created 33, 918 jobs.
35, 522 jobs created in 2019-20
During the 2019-20 financial year, Masisi said a total of 975 businesses owned by young people were funded to the tune of P94, 671, 778 and in the process, creating 1, 918 jobs. He said the number of interns absorbed in formal employment was 8, 457 and a total of 1,954 jobs were created through the YDF. Masisi also indicated during the 2019-20 financial year, the Citizen Entrepreneurial Development Agency (CEDA), funded 2, 127 businesses valued at P451 million which translated in the creation of 3, 883 jobs during the period under review. He said during the same financial year, the Botswana Development Corporation’s (BDC) project achievements during this period include the establishment of the Francistown Academic Hospital has created 270 jobs. Masisi indicated that between April 2019 and June 2020, the BITC’s investment promotion drive resulted in the creation of 4, 382 jobs. He said the Local Enterprise Authority (LEA) then supported 1,078 SMMEs and the assistance availed to the latter led to the creation of 1,391 new jobs. Masisi said during the 2019-2020 financial year, waste management projects created a total of 13,267 jobs.
9, 000 jobs created in 2020-21 In 2020, according to Masisi, BoFiNet established an Internet TV content aggregation and distribution platform, called UPIC TV. The initiative resulted in a total of 4, 000 jobs across the creative sector. In the 2021 SONA, Masisi also revealed that since the revision of CEDA guidelines in 2019, the Agency then funded over 4, 000 youth-owned businesses, at the value of over P200 million, an investment he said had created more than 5,000 jobs.
2, 465 jobs created in 2021-22 During the 2021-2022 financial year, Masisi pointed out that P80 million was disbursed through the YDF to support youth entrepreneurship development and this resulted in the creation of 1,320 jobs for the youth. Masisi indicated that the mining sector had created new 1,145 jobs since 2021.
But overall, the numbers show that jobs created had dropped every year with fewer jobs created between 2020 and 2021 when the pandemic was at its peak. The COVID-19 epidemic during this period triggered a wave of economic issues throughout the world, including Botswana. Companies struggled to survive in the face of lockdowns and there was a decrease in consumer spending. Many resorted to closing down and trimming their staff, increasing unemployment rates. With Botswana facing a wider economic uncertainty, the string of layoffs following the frenzy of COVID-19 increased. Government earlier this year revealed that since last year February, 860 employees had been retrenched.