the monitor

RAMOJAKA music festival to combat cross-border crimes

RAMOJAKGÀ organisers
RAMOJAKGÀ organisers

FRANCISTOWN: The annual RAMOJAKGA festival coordinator, Diamond Daniel, has stated that the festival's proceeds will go towards combating crime along the Botswana-Zimbabwe border.

RAMOJAKGA is an acronym for the villages of Ramokgwebana, Moroka, Jackackals No. 1, and Kgari (RAMOJAKA).The music festival, which is scheduled to take place at the Chitawa Lodge on September 21, is a community project through a partnership with Bana Bana Ba Ntogwa cultural group and affected villages. Chitawa Lodge is situated in the middle of the mentioned villages along the A1 road, just a stone throw from the Ramokgwebana border. When addressing a press conference, Daniel said the primary goal is to raise money for the purpose of combating crime in the mentioned villages, which are located close to the border between Botswana and Zimbabwe. He said the festival is a way of giving back to the community that they serve by raising funds to combat crime through music.

Daniel stated they have partnered with the impacted communities in order to raise funds for a vehicle, protective gear, touches, horses and other equipments that the local policing clusters can use for border patrols. He said while the things on the list are short-term objectives, one of their long-term plans is to buy and install a camera on top of Tegwi hill in Ramokgwebana that can monitor an area up to 50 kilometers around the hill. These cameras will assist monitoring cross border crime activities so that stolen goods can be in recovered and also assist in capturing the criminals' movements, he added. “Over the past year, people from these villages have been losing their belongings. The culprits would break-in and cross the border with the stolen goods to Zimbabwe,” he explained. He further said this initiative will not only benefit the villages located near the border but all in Botswana. Daniel indicated that the cultural festival will include a cultural family fun day and a festival at night.

Editor's Comment
Depression is real; let's take care of our mental health

It is not uncommon in this part of the world for parents to actually punish their children when they show signs of depression associating it with issues of indiscipline, and as a result, the poor child will be lashed or given some kind of punishment. We have had many suicide cases in the country and sadly some of the cases included children and young adults. We need to start looking into issues of mental health with the seriousness it...

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