GABORONE - Botswana has been elected as the registrar general and chairperson of the African Regional Intellectual Property Organisation (ARIPO) administrative council.

The nomination and election took place at the on-going 33rd session of the administration council of ARIPO in Gaborone.

The outgoing chairperson, Ms Sentsuoe Mohau of Lesotho, reported that the organisation is taking shape towards achieving its mandate and that she was handing over an organisation with a clean financial record.

Ms Mohau said despite the good financial background of her organisation, there were challenges such as the need to improve communication between the secretariat and the member states to increase membership of the organisation and the need for countries to domesticate their national laws to incorporate ARIPO protocol.

She added that the organisation is endowed with committees on finance and staff welfare, but it needs to establish other committees on intellectual property laws and policies as well as technical committees to deal with technical matters in their variations with a view to further strengthen the organisation.

Ms Mohau urged Botswana to continue to engage the secretariat as well as members of the administrative council to steer the organisation to greater heights, adding that the organisation is grateful for the support of the international community relating to some intellectual property issues.BOPA