FCC councillors rebuke Matambo over job creation
Lesedi Mkhutshwa | Friday February 10, 2017 11:42
Matambo said this on Monday during 2017/2018 budget speech delivered in Parliament. In an interview with Mmegi Itekeng ward councillor, Lesego Kwambala expressed great disappointment, saying Matambo was mistaken when he said that it is not the responsibility of the Government to create employment.
“As a mater of fact it is the role of the government to generate jobs for its citizens,” he said.
According to Kwambala the P570 million awarded to the constituencies is a good initiative but on the contrary, the money could have been used to create over eight million permanent jobs for the youth. He further said that there are vacancies in different departments and wondered why they are not filled.
Kwambala also complained about the reduction of the Francistown City Council (FCC) budget after disclosing that it was cut down by close to P34 million, which is going to affect the development of the city. Kwambala was surprised that a lot of money was allocated to the Ministry of Defence, Justice and Security.
“More billions of pula are allocated to the Ministry of Defence, Justice and Security for no apparent reasons. But the Ministry of Local Government is suffering whereas it is the core of people’s livelihood,” he said.
He further disagreed with the government on poverty eradication, saying December 2017 was an unrealistic target.
Specially elected councillor and former mayor James Kgalajwe concurred with Kwambala that government should invest more on the creation of jobs through creating a conducive environment and partnering with the private sector.
“We should now focus on manufacturing industries in order to boost our economy. The government should establish processing plants for minerals so that they can be able to export finished local products than raw materials,” he said.
Kgalajwe is however pleased that the Ministry of Basic Education was allocated the largest share of P6.80 billion, which would help in the development of school infrastructure.Kgalajwe also stated that councils should stop being dependent on central government for funding.
“As local authorities we should find sustainable ways of generating income for the councils in order to boost the economy of our cities,” he said. Councillor for Tshwaragano ward Gaone Majere said that he was expecting Matambo to have tackled the issue of public servants salary increment.