Bontleng Marketplace Still A Void

Be that as it may, the edifice was put up by the council as a marketplace in the mid-1980s. But it became an instant white elephant because vendors, for whom it was built, said it was not strategically located and that there was no business in the area.
They preferred the Gaborone train and bus station which was - and is - always teeming with people.

Ironically today, vendors selling cigarettes, candies and other small items are 'squatting' in the area surrounding the very market they or their predecessors rejected.
The market was built during the tenure of the late Paul Rantao, the flamboyant former mayor of Gaborone. This was just after his Botswana National Front (BNF) took over control of the Gaborone City Council for the first time.