Kudos to Boko for acting on health crisis

The Monitor Editor | Wednesday August 27, 2025 16:56

For years, Batswana have endured the anxiety of unreliable medical supplies, a situation where the very promise of healing was broken by a chronically failed system. The sight of understocked clinics and the stories of patients turned away have become familiar. Today, however, we must commend President Duma Boko and Health Minister Stephen Modise for their decisive and long-overdue action. Their bold move demonstrates the leadership and urgency this national scandal has long demanded.

This announcement is significant because it represents a comprehensive plan, not a mere reaction. The detailed four-step strategy, born from unprecedented inter-ministerial collaboration that even involved late-night meetings, tackles the issue with both immediate force and visionary foresight. Unlocking emergency resources, establishing the substantial Health First Botswana Fund, and appointing a dedicated National Task Force show a government finally moving at the speed a crisis requires. The involvement of the BDF Logistics Command is a particular masterstroke, injecting essential discipline and a results-oriented ethos into a procurement process historically crippled by bureaucracy and delays.

Most importantly, the administration has correctly diagnosed the disease at the heart of this malaisse, a procurement system deliberately riddled with profiteering middlemen that systematically bled public funds dry. The staggering P625 million difference between the old Central Medical Stores quote and the task force’s price for the same medicines is a scandal of epic proportions that fully justifies this emergency intervention. The commitment to bypass these costly schemes and source directly from manufacturers is the clearest and most sensible path to securing affordable, quality medicines for all citizens.

Yet, a bold plan on paper is only as good as its flawless execution. We commend the leadership, but now the immense hard work begins in earnest. We call on every single official on the Task Force, every accountant at Finance, and every officer involved to implement this vital plan with unwavering integrity, total transparency, and relentless focus. The enormous P5 billion fund must be guarded fiercely against the very vested interests it seeks to dismantle. Every tender must be scrupulously fair, every price must be fiercely scrutinised, and every delivery must be meticulously tracked using the data-driven methods promised.

The people of Botswana have been promised a lasting cure. The President and his team have written the prescription. It is now incumbent upon every single person tasked with implementation to dispense it correctly.