Biggest obstacle to creating jobs is bureaucracy, not attracting ‘ditsala tsa bahumi’
Mphoeng Mphoeng | Thursday October 23, 2025 12:23
I definitely commend the efforts of all the respective stakeholders doing that work but sometimes it feels like we are missing what the actual problem is in creating jobs and investment in Botswana. It is not finding people and businesses interested in setting up in Botswana. Big money has always been interested in us and rightfully so. We have built the country’s brand and goodwill on being well managed and stable and many businesses including South African ones would love to come here.
Our biggest challenge has always been our systems of capitalising on the interest. Melao ya rona e tobekane, conflicts and fight each other. The interest is there but being able to convert that interest into actual business is where the problem is. Our business ecosystem is terrible and this has always been reflected by our poor results in the “Ease of Doing Business” rankings.
Let me give a couple of anecdotes on this. I was once part of a team sent to Dubai during the Dubai Expo to try attract business to Botswana. For our main event, we had more than 200 UAE based investors who came to our half-day pitch session. The room was full of excitement and after the event I had more than 10 people approach me with an interest to come to Botswana. Most I referred to BITC individuals but some flat out refused saying this was not the first time they had attempted to work in Botswana but had been frustrated by our channels and eventually gave up. Emails and phone calls not being responded to eventually made them quit.
On another occasion I bumped into a potential investor at OR Tambo who talked about attempting to move his manufacturing business from Zimbabwe to Botswana. His business employed more than 100 people. He said he’d spent close to nine months trying to get registered and to find land via our official channels to no avail. He eventually relocated to North West in South Africa where everything he required was availed in two weeks.
Most frustrating though are the stories from local businesses who have attempted to take advantage of special economic zones like SPEDU. Some have taken their life savings and moved to Selebi Phikwe, only to find that the issues they were promised, do not happen. Most of these eventually quit and give up. I even know of businesses where empowerment policies like government prioritising purchasing from local businesses are just not honoured. Different businesses have tried and failed to supply local councils even ko SPEDU region despite being set up there. Procurement officers simply ignore them despite leadership efforts to make the environment easier for businesses.
Investment promotion efforts have been frustrated by good intentions with land, tax, permit promises which can’t actually be put in practice because BURS, land ministry, immigration and PPRA have got their own acts which don’t allow certain things. So our special economic zones and investment promotion efforts tend to promise a lot of things and generally can’t deliver because our systems are not streamlined. BITC, SEZA and OP will make efforts but without them controlling the whole value chain such as business and tax registration and licensing, immigration and permitting, land allocation and so many more; all of their efforts are in vain.
BITC having to go get in a queue for land allocation at the ministry as well as beg Immigration (and DIS actually) for work and residence permits which take more than a year just defeats every effort. While BITC boasts a “one stop shop”, this is in theory and not in practice because the respective ministries which could actually make the one stop shop effective, just frustrate the efforts. When it comes to concessions, we claim we have on the tax front, but most of these do not actually happen with the BURS Act frustrating efforts (though I was told last year this could be changing, if it hasn’t changed already).
Now all of these challenges are not new. In fact, the Ministry of Trade has a “Ease of Doing Business” Unit specifically attempting to fix these issues but the reality is that not enough focus and light is put on sorting these issues out. If the same amount of effort and drive was placed on actually sorting out our real challenges as attracting the investors, we’d be very far. A lot more businesses would be able to set up; allowing both local and international investors to set up easily and create jobs. It should also not be forgotten that SMEs are where real job growth comes from. So while we love to put effort on the big ticket investors, real jobs and progress will be where we attract the small and mid-tier investor who will employ 20 to 50 people. The key to job growth is making it such that the small investor is able to seamlessly set up, get licensed and operate within a short period of time. (Coincidentally it was announced that Dangote’s close to BWP1 billion investment will initially create 35 jobs only).
In conclusion, let the fanfare continue over attracting international and local projects but I pray that the President and his Cabinet focus more on the systemic, regulatory and policy issues. In a week where the President bemoaned government inefficiency, I ask him to focus a lot of energy on clearing out these bottle necks and then sit back and watch the 100,000 jobs come as Botswana stops frustrating its own diversification and economic stimulation efforts.
*Mphoeng Mphoeng is a director at a corporate finance, economics and investment consultancy, MP Consultants. He has previously worked at University of Botswana, BIFM, Standard Chartered and Bank of Botswana