The Consumer Protection Regulations are perhaps the least enforced of all of them but the more I think about it, the less I think that matters. The best thing that could happen for all the consumers of Botswana would be if we could enforce the Regulations ourselves instead of relying on the Department of Consumer Affairs to do it for us. The combination of a personal right of enforcement of the Regulations and the Small Claims Court would be incredibly useful. That way we could all act like grown-ups, get advice from the necessary government departments or other resources like Consumer Watchdog and then enforce our rights ourselves. That would be true "empowerment".
However there are times when specialists are needed, when you and I are faced with a business situation when experts are needed. Education and training are good examples of this. How are we to know whether a local college employs genuinely qualified teachers and lecturers? We don't get to see their degree certificates, we don't get to see the real syllabus until too late, we don't get to see their history. That's why BOTA, the Training Authority was set up. You can visit their web site and see a list of all the local training and education providers and every course they offer that has been approved by BOTA. What's more, every so often you see a notice in Mmegi and other papers from BOTA warning us about colleges that have tried to operate without BOTA accreditation. They make it perfectly clear that we should take our training needs and cash elsewhere.
