Choppies to heal the poor

Monitor Editor | Monday February 2, 2015 12:24

As per the agreement, Choppies will be lending the Foundation its private airplane to help transport specialist doctors and health care professionals from Gaborone to regional clinics. According to Choppies Managing Director, Ramachandran Ottapath, Choppies will be releasing their reliable aircraft of 16 years.

There is no doubt that accessing most parts of sparse rural Botswana without the use of aircraft can be an expensive exercise.

Choppies  is not new to community development matters. They have donated over 100 houses through the President Housing Appeal. Sometimes when a corporation the size of Choppies does something for the community people can simply take it for granted that it can do so because it is a big company anyway. But how many big companies have come forward and invested deliberately on communities by building them tens of houses, clinics, or flying doctors to rural areas to attend to the sick?

We hope that by recognising the role that corporations such as Choppies play in our communities, others will likewise join with the knowledge that their efforts will not be in vain, they will be recognised and appreciated for developing Batswana.

  

Solution for HIV in prison 

The National AIDS Coordinating Agency (NACA)’s announcement that they have started a survey on sexual behaviour of inmates with a view to mitigating the situation is long overdue.

While we cannot wait for the day when inmates will be provided with condoms to control the spread of HIV, we would also like to urge NACA to speed up the publication of this survey and make it public.

It is our humble view that the public deserves to know the outcome of this survey since their beloved ones happen to spend part of their lives in prisons.

Perhaps this survey will also go a long way towards informing us about the extent of sexual coercion that allegedly takes place in prisons at the instigation of bullies.