Young Progressives applaud Kenewendo's appointment
Tsaone Basimanebotlhe | Tuesday April 17, 2018 15:25
“It is indeed possible that the youth and women are also capable therefore deserve to be entrusted with leadership responsibilities. With her decorated CV we believe she is the best amongst Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) Members of Parliament. However, we want to warn the nation that they must not get too excited with this appointment because the BDP wants to use it as a carrot for the youth to claim that they care for and believe in them,” APYL president Jacob Kelebeng said.
Kelebeng added Kenewendo must at all times remember her peers roaming the streets in poverty, the unemployed young people who sleep everyday with no hope for tomorrow.
He called upon the minister to stand up for the girl-child and their human rights that are violated everyday by the regime.
He continued: “The nation must remember that President Masisi has been a member of Parliament, a minister and a vice president of this country for the last 10 years. During his tenure as an influential member of the executive he failed dismally where he was tasked with many responsibilities such as job creation, the poverty eradication programme, and improving labour unions and workers’ relations”.
The youth leader said President Mokgweetsi Masisi has never reported back to Batswana about the progress he made in his infamous ‘nyeletso lehuma’.
He said unemployment is another burning issue and a time ticking bomb about to explode and according to Botswana Multi Topic Household Survey (BMTHS) report unemployment declined from 20% in 2013 to 17.7% in 2016.
“We believe that the research is fake hence deserves to be condemned with outmost contempt. The BDP-led government still fails to provide employment solutions for its own people. Many workers experienced job losses in state-owned enterprises on account of retrenchments. Botswana Water Utilities Corporation (WUC), Botswana Meat Commission (BMC), Botswana Power Corporation (BPC), and Air Botswana have retrenched hundreds of their employees,” he said.
Kelebeng said the private sector is bleeding, shedding jobs at a rate never experienced before.
First National Bank, G4S, Builders Warehouse, KBL are but a fraction of the companies that have felt the brunt of the current operating environment and sacrificed the workforce for continued survival in 2017, he said.
APYL appointed Phemelo Kedumele as the secretary general and Ndibo Seven as the deputy secretary general following the resignation of their then secretary general Lame Segokgo due to work commitments.