Masisi gets the nod from Khama
Tsaone Basimanebotlhe | Tuesday November 7, 2017 16:35
“Madam Speaker, in accordance with the Constitution, five months from now I shall be passing the baton of leadership of our great country into the capable hands of His Honour the Vice President.
I am confident that with the support of members of this House and the nation as a whole, the next administration will continue to build on the legacy of progress that began under my predecessors,” Khama said.
Khama also revealed that the Speaker of the National Assembly Gladys Kokorwe will also be retiring in 2019.
On the issue of unemployment and poverty, Khama said he is confident that the country shall overcome the challenges.
“As I said at the beginning of this statement, we also have in our revised long-term Vision and 11th National Development Plan the signposts for our medium to long term progress in this regard.
But to achieve our vision of a better future by 2036, while overcoming our current challenges, will require greater commitment and productivity from all sectors of society,” he said.
The President said the Botswana Police Service (BPS) development budget has increased by 49% from P209 million in 2008/9 to P312 million in 2017/18.
“This has enabled the Service to improve its performance. According to the Global Competitiveness Report for 2016–2017, Botswana ranks highly in terms of reliability of the police service.
In terms of achievement by the BPS in crime prevention, the areas of violent and intrusive crimes including violence against women and children shows a decline; having been reduced between 2008 and 2016 by 46%, from 26,150 incidents to 14,224,” he said.
According to the President, it includes a nearly two-thirds reduction in burglary, thefts and robberies.
In addition, he said there has been a 57% reduction in threat-to-kill and a 32% reduction in motor vehicle theft.
“There is, however, a growing trend of drug abuse for which interventions will be made to better resource the Botswana police capability in this area,” Khama stated.
He said during the period from January 2017 to June 2017, the number of road accidents went down by 13.2% with the number of people who died also declining by 11.5%.
He said it has been established that road accidents in Botswana are linked predominantly to driver carelessness, over-speeding, unlicensed drivers and impaired driving due to alcohol consumption.