Chadibe — The Minister of Transport and Communications, Mr Tshenolo Mabeo, has informed residents of Chadibe in in the Tutume Sub-district that youing people will, in the near future, operate kitsong centres.
Addressing a kgotla meeting in the village on May 28, Minister Mabeo stated that most of the centres throughout the country had collapsed despite government's desire and efforts to spread the use of information technology to different places.
"When the centres were established, they were put under the care of Village Development Committees (VDCs) but that did not save the centres; hence they had not been useful," he noted.
He said his ministry had therefore decided to change its approach so that young people could be trained to operate kitsiong centres allocated to them. The minister said youth were better placed to run the centres because they were more energetic and experimental than adult-stacked VDCs.
He emphasised that the government was working around the clock to spread the use of information technology across the country; hence the installation of fiber cables around the country so that the Internet would be installed in all government offices in every village where the cables passed.
Such efforts, he said, were aimed at improving services offered at all different government offices so that Batswana would enjoy the best services offered in the world.
He said they no longer wanted to have situations whereby people will be forced to travel long distances at a cost to get services offered on the latest technologies.
In addition, the minister informed the residents that his ministry was working hard to upgrade post offices nationally to improve services offered.
He noted that despite the many services offered, public feedback indicated that there were concerns, which prompts the ministry to make improvements on the service standards offered by the post office.
Meanwhile, the residents complained that after appealing for so long for government to tar a road connecting them to the main A3 highway, they have told that there were no funds.
On other issues, they complained about public transport operators who do not complete their routes citing bad state of roads.
Mr Dikatso Raditsebe, one of the residents, said failure to complete routes by some operators affected mostly the elderly as they were dropped very far from where they stay; hence they are forced to walk long distances, which most of them struggle to do.
In his response, Mr Mabeo said public transport operators should abide by the conditions of their permits and if they fail to do so, the Department of Road Transport and Safety (DRTS) should take action.
Regarding the road, he said they should be patient as the developments are slow as a result of the economic downturn, which has affected the whole world.
Source : BOPA
