Mpetsane is new NED council chairperson
Pini Bothoko | Tuesday December 2, 2014 14:58
Dikitso Mandevu was also elected, unopposed, the Vice Chairperson.
The duo represent the Botswana Democratic Party that holds the majority seats in council.
The BDP has 20 councillors followed by Botswana Congress Party with two councillors and one councillor for the Umbrella for Democratic Change.
In her first address after ascending to the seat, Mpetsane pleaded with civic leaders to work as a team to achieve the goals they had for the district.
She noted that the district has a number of challenges, ranging from shortage of serviced land, poor roads networks, low economic activities, high HIV/AIDS prevalence rate and unemployment.
She said the councillors had to pay attention to challenges, come up with good interventions that will have positive impacts on the livelihood of the NED people.
Mpetsane said that the government has come up with a number of economic empowerment programmes that are geared towards improved living standards of the people.
She said that these programmes include Poverty Eradication Programme, Youth Department Fund, Livestock Management and Infrastructure Development (LIMID) and Integrated Support Programme for Agriculture Arable Development (ISPAAD).
“As councillors we need to work hard for proper and efficient implementation of these programmes in the district meant to improve the lives of Batswana and reduce unemployment,” she said.
Also challenging was the health services and fight against life threatening diseases like HIV/AIDS, cancer and even Ebola, she said.
Mpetsane said that NED has been facing a huge challenge of shortage of ambulances and specialised personnel or doctors.
“I have also observed that our health posts and clinics need to be upgraded especially that during the previous plans most villages have demanded upgrading of their clinics especially the ones with maternity wings,” she said.
She said that even though provision of water in most of the district is generally satisfactory, however there is inadequate supply of water in the eastern parts of the district.
Mpetsane said that since the take over of water services by Water Utilities Corporation (WUC) from council there have been challenges of delayed water connections, inconsistent water bills and continuous leakages.
She said that these are some of the challenges that councillors need to start thinking about to ensure better mitigation measures for them.
Also proving problematic for the district is the influx of illegal immigrants.
“I know that some of them are our relatives and have stayed for years in this country but it is not good for our country.
This affects our planning and projections hence lead to overstretching of national resources,” she said.
For his part, Mandevu promised to put the community ‘s needs first. He noted that roads in the district are in a bad state and that there was need for a district abattoir and a fire station.