24 Sep 2024

As the journey to the October 30 national polls gathers pace, Kanye East constituency has become turf for a two-man race where Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC) and the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) seek to outdo each other in contest for the constituency’s parliamentary seat.

Tussling for the soul of the constituency in a live Radio Botswana debate on Monday, UCD’s Mr Prince Mosanana and Mr Thapelo Letsholo of the BDP, each appealed to voters to consider them, advancing several reasons why their representation of Kanye East in parliament would safeguard their interests.

Mr Mosanana said with the constituency contending with challenges such as unemployment, bad roads, and water supply challenges in Kanye, he was a fitting candidate to address the problems as his party had in place sound strategies to tackle them.

He said the BDP failed to create sustainable jobs for Batswana, and leaned heavily on Ipelegeng programme, which had at inception been formulated as a short-term intervention.

He said once in office, he would advocate for the construction of good road networks for the constituency to save road users the despair of having to use bad roads riddled with potholes.

Regarding Kanye’s water woes, he said the BDP failed to address the problem despite having promised voters in the run-up to the 2019 general elections that the problem would soon belong in history books, arguing that it was sad that five years on, Kanye residents were still grappling with water scarcity.

Mr Mosanana said it was surprising that government had gone ahead to implement a sewer network upgrading project in Kanye at a time when the bulk of the residents did not have access to potable water.

The prospective candidate further said if given the mandate to govern, the UDC would revive the economy and make it robust through among others mineral beneficiation, which he said would in turn contribute to the party’s employment creation strategies. He said they would also do their all to stop corruption, which he said bled the economy and pushed ordinary citizens into poverty.

On the one hand, Mr Letsholo said BDP had been tested over time and had showed to be committed to the general development of the citizen.

He said the party continually came up with strategies to develop long-lasting solutions to address societal challenges such as crime in all its manifestations, unemployment especially the youth, and gaps that existed in sectors such as education and health.

Mr Letsholo who seeks another chance as Member of Parliament for the area said he would continue to advocate for stringent penalties for perpetrators of stock-theft related cases, adding that Botswana Police Service’s KgomoKhumo operation should be turned into a permanent unit responsible for championing of all efforts aimed at fighting livestock-related crimes.

Further, he said BDP looked towards establishing specialist courts of law whose mandate would be to deal with cases of corruption. Mr Letsholo said the recent launch of 28 police stations across the country spoke to government’s commitment to fight crime and make Botswana safe.

On unemployment, he said BDP-led government had availed an array of economic empowerment programmes which beneficiaries could use to earn a living and create jobs for themselves and fellow citizens. Mr Letsholo further said Botswana was on course to adopt the use of telemedicine in its health facilities. He said the connectivity to high-speed internet of health facilities throughout the countries was aimed at paving the way for the use of telemedicine, a practice he said would enhance delivery of medical service to the general population. Still on health, he said the state-of-the-art hospital whose construction will soon take off in Kanye would bring world-class health services to the people of Kanye East.

The hospital, he said would be a yardstick of the type of health facilities BDP government would avail to Batswana going into the future, that forming part of its commitment to make accessible to citizens medical services of unparalleled standards.

As for Kanye’s water challenges, the said said a project to address the problem was underway and was expected to be completed next month.

With the two candidates having laid bare their intentions regarding the future of the constituency, the power remains vested on voters to make their pick, thereby determining the direction that the Kanye East would take in terms of developments and to the general welfare of residents. ENDS