The Commissioner of Police responsible for Support Services Mr Ikwathaeng Bagopi says crime, especially those offences involving violence and intrusive in nature remain very high in Botswana.

Officiating at the launch of the Tati Nickel mine’s safety campaign under the theme Choice that encouraged the mine workers to be responsible in making personal choices, Mr Bagopi appealed to the Mine employees to also take responsibility for their own security by availing themselves to the Botswana Police’s partnership propgrammes,

He said they should readily and voluntarily partake in the existing neighborhood watch schemes and crime prevention clusters in their respective areas.

Mr Bagopi said the Botswana Police is seriously concerned about the high incidents of rape, passion killings and the general abuse of women and children, saying incidents of robbery; burglary and theft that are usually executed with violence and recklessness are uncompromisingly high.

He also said road traffic accidents that cause serious injuries and deaths are a major source of concern and challenged Tati Nickel mine workers to play an active role to ensure that they reduce the alarming rate of accidents.

He said safety and welfare of employees were critical issues, advising the Tati Nickel mine to treat such issues with seriousness, saying the campaign was a good example of such commitment.

He said injuries and fatalities in the mine should be kept at bare minimum and urged employees to improve the standard of safety, it dependeded on their responsible judgment and better choices as echoed by their campaign theme.

Mr Bagopi further warned the Tati Nickel mine workers against the culture of multiple concurrent sexual partners, saying HIV/AIDS prevalence in the country continues to maintain an upward trend together with the number of people on ARV therapy that cause associated cost to be unsustainable.

He therefore appealed to them to exercise a sense of personal responsibility in whatever they do, urging them to always avail themselves for voluntary testing to benefit from available programmes.