In her welcoming remarks, the Assistant Minister of MLG & RD, Hon. Tshireletso reminded the audience that FCM was established last year in response to some of the strategic leadership challenges that were facing local governance and service delivery in Botswana. Furthermore, Hon. Tshireletso stressed that “there is need to frequently meet and share ideas and experiences from different respective districts, towns and cities.”
In addition, Hon. Tshireletso noted that the forum gives attendees an opportunity to evaluate and assess progress that they have made, as well as developing a blue print on how they intend to move forward with the country’s development agenda.
During his keynote address, Hon. Siele availed to the audience that there has been a major developments in the Ministry, which came about as a result of His Excellencys State of the Nation Address. He stated that “effective from 5th November 2012, our Ministry’s mandate has been widened to incorporate a new function of Rural Development, hence it has been renamed, The Ministry of Local Development and Rural development.”
To augment this, Hon. Siele added that due to this development, new areas of emphasis in rural development will include, promotion of self-reliance and sustainable livelihood approaches, harmonization of social protection programmes to facilitate appropriate graduation of beneficiaries and investment in leadership at the local level to build a core of community leaders that can drive community based interventions.
Hon. Siele further noted that declining service delivery by officers is concerning. He also mentioned that “there is need to put emphasis on issues of decentralization, delegation of authority and capacity building for Sub-districts, Administrative Authority and Service centres.” Other vital issues that he touched were; District Ministerial Briefings, supervision and coordination of institutions, Kgotla meetings, financial management and cleanliness of villages