Soldiers retiring straight into poverty, says Segokgo
Pini Bothoko | Thursday June 8, 2017 15:58
Appearing before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) yesterday, Segokgo said there was an urgent need to revise the BDF Act to help out ex-soldiers who were leaving the Force and sinking straight into poverty. The commander said this was because the pensions were structured wrongly and unfairly.
“The review will also address the retirement age of soldiers as we have been losing very key technically-skilled employees,” he said. “Some skills mature with age and we can use such personnel for our training.
However, when we allow them to retire early, we tend to lose key employees and then take years to re-train others.” He said the revised Act would raise the retirement age for soldiers, except privates and lance corporals whose duties were physically intensive and for whom the retirement age of 45 was “understandable”.
“Some officers have scarce skills and we want to extend their retirement ages so that we do not lose them when they are still fit and active to do the job. We would like our doctors to retire at the age of 65 and retain them if they are still capable,” Segokgo said. Later, Gaborone Bonnington South legislator, Ndaba Gaolathe asked Segokgo how ready the BDF was to respond to natural disasters, saying the recent flooding of villages during Cyclone Dineo had revealed capacity shortcomings. “Do you have enough resources to respond and monitor such issues? How ready are you to assist Batswana if disasters more than that occur?” Gaolathe enquired.
In response, Segokgo said climate change was one of the threats the BDF was monitoring as it was driving some of the disasters seen today.
“We can never have enough resources, but we are trying by all means to balance the little we have.
“Disasters can occur and impact negatively on things such as underground water reserves. Even in the past, there was pollution of the Okavango River water and that was something that needed an immediate response,” he said.
Specially Elected MP, Bogolo Kenewendo asked whether it was true that the BDF was not paying its employees according to their qualifications. “There are allegations that people with certificates or diplomas are treated the same at BDF. Is this true?” Kenewendo asked.
Segokgo said while the BDF was not treated like the public service in terms of qualifications, the matter was being addressed so that remuneration matched qualifications.