Batswana helping foreigners to obtain Omang, passports
Lebogang Mosikare | Thursday January 7, 2016 14:40
This has emerged in cases before courts of law, especially after the culprits were caught attempting to apply for renewal of the documents.
In the latest case, Gadzanani Mageu, 40, of Masvingo village in Zimbabwe on Wednesday admitted having acquired his national identity card illegally in Francistown in 1999 at the offices of Civil and National Registration.
Mageu, a herdboy, is charged with one count of giving false information to a person employed in the public service.
The case was scheduled for trial yesterday before Principal Magistrate Dumisani Basupi, but was postponed to Thursday this week to allow the state to correct the particulars of offence in the charge sheet.
Mageu told the court that he was born in Zimbabwe but came to Botswana as a minor where his father, who is a Motswana, helped him to apply for Omang, which he finally obtained.
“I did not follow the correct procedures for applying for Omang,” said Mageu when questioned by Basupi.
Last year Basupi lamented that Batswana were assisting foreigners to obtain Omang illegally.
He said so after a 70-year-old woman was found guilty of giving false information to a person employed in the public service in order to help a Zimbabwean to obtain Omang.
The accused, Maria Ntatiwa, was found guilty of aiding Thapelo Elliot obtain Omang at Sowa Town in 2008. Ntatiwa had claimed to be Elliot’s aunt. She was fined P1, 000 payable in seven days in default of which she shall spend a year in jail.
Elliot’s Omang has since been revoked and he was deported to Zimbabwe.
In a similar case, Basupi found Simbarashe Mapfumo guilty of obtaining a passport through dubious means.
Basupi also sentenced Ntombizodwa Mpofu, 60, after finding her guilty of helping four people acquire Omang. She was fined P500.
In a related matter, Patrick Chirunga is facing a single count of obtaining Omang and another for acquiring a passport illegally.
The state believes that Chirunga is a Zimbabwean.
The Minster of Labour and Home Affairs, Edwin Batshu has also at different forums cautioned locals who help foreigners to obtain Omang and passports through dubious means.
Batshu said it still remained a mystery how the national identity cards ended up in the hands of foreigners.
He said even though some foreigners used lost cards, it was disturbing to note that some citizens however might be conniving with foreigners to perform such unlawful acts.
He therefore urged residents to report such acts to law enforcement officers. He encouraged locals to value the importance of an Omang card and the civil liberties that one could have access when in possession of a valid Omang card.
Government, the minister said, has empowerment programmes and schemes all geared towards uplifting livelihoods of citizenry which were only accessible when one has a valid Omang card, hence Batswana have to ensure the safe keeping of identity cards.
Batshu has also made mention of the fact that Botswana passports were also in the past recovered from people of different nationalities who mostly obtained them unlawfully.
He stated that the use of Botswana passports by foreigners has compelled his ministry to change the system governing the issuance of the passports and improve some security topographies in order to improve their authenticity.
Batshu said it was a great concern that some Batswana were selling their passports to foreigners for large sums of money and later applied for new ones with the knowledge that new passport application fees were little.
“A lot of Botswana passports were used in all kinds of criminal acts therefore it was only fitting to find measures on how best to remedy the situation,” he said.
He stated that it was imperative for the public to know that a passport remained government property and therefore should be handled with care and honour.