It is a fact that cannot be over emphasized enough. Mahalapye is one of the big villages in Botswana. Its population is estimated at over 43,000. Most residents are unemployed and live in abject poverty. Soon, Mahalapye West will be electing a representative to replace long-serving Mompati Merafhe who has quit as vice-president and MP due to ill-health. Though Mahalapye has got a new police station and hospital, it is lagging behind in development. The village has been surpassed by its Ngwato sisters - Palapye and Serowe in private sector development. Palapye and Serowe are slowly turning into industrial sites and attractive centres for investors. Both have a reasonable network of tarred roads unlike Mahalapye. The fact that the village hosts the country's railway headquarters has never been a source of pride. Apart from a couple of lodges and a market area with many shops and fast-food restaurants and a few petrol stations, there are no serious businesses in Mahalapye. The dirty bus rank is not well structured. The village remains bushy and dirty. Mahalapye has simply been reduced to a less attractive and poverty stricken village.
As one of the young people in the village Kenanao Gillate would put it, it is high time the people of Mahalapye have vigorous access to the government schemes to improve their lives. Gillate is interested in farming but he does not have the funds to develop his land. He is still waiting for funding from the Citizen Entrepreneurial Development Agency (CEDA) through the Young Farmers Fund initiative.
