The Midweek Sun

BULKY MOGADISHU Rakgare proposes division of Mogoditsha­ne into two constiuenc­ies

- BY KEIKANTSE LESEMELA

The Member of Parliament for Mogoditsha­ne, Tumiso Rakgare proposed that Mogoditsha­ne constituen­cy be divided into two to reduce the amount of work for the officials as the village is highly populated.

Rakgare said that Mogoditsha­ne is the most populated and fastest growing village in Botswana but there are few resources to serve the residents.

According to the preliminar­y results from Statistics Botswana, there are 88 098 people in the area making it the highest populated village in the country.

“We are going to discuss this as politician­s and national leaders to come up with solutions to address this issue.

We should have two constituen­cies for Mogoditsha­ne because the population is huge and this is overwhelmi­ng for the MP, councillor­s and officials.”

Addressing residents in Mogoditsha­ne recently, Rakgare said they are setting up a community developmen­t trust that will help generate revenue for community developmen­t.

He pointed out that the village is currently under siege from limited resources, high unemployme­nt rate, high criminal rate, as well as plot allocation backlog.

“We have so many challenges but we can address some of the challenges by establishi­ng a community trust that will help generate revenue so that we can fund some of the community developmen­t projects.

“We are at an advanced stage to establish the trust, all the necessary paper work is complete so we are just waiting to open a bank account,” he said.

The MP also raised concern about health services in the village, stating that although densely populated, there are only two clinics to serve close to 90 000 residents.

“This is also another area where we need the support of the business operators in the village.

Mogoditsha­ne is accommodat­ing a lot of businesses and some of these businesses are contaminat­ing our land, they should take care of the people and the environmen­t.”

He explained that through the trust, the village community hall will be refurbishe­d and developed to host activities that will generate income for village developmen­t.

Mogoditsha­ne Senior Assistant Council Secretary, Losika Mosarwa, said they are concerned about the increasing number of residents whom he suspects are attracted by the many one room-rental houses in the area.

“We are now facing a chal

lenge of one-roomed houses which increase waste in the village.

We urge the community leaders to assist in this regard.”

He said that Mogoditsha­ne sub-council has been trying to seek official allocation for Dikgotla but the land board has not yet approved.

“We have made 96 submission­s for Dikgotla but only five have been approved.

This is not satisfacto­ry but we will keep on trying.”

 ?? ?? FEELING THE HEAT: MP Tumiso Rakgare says Mogoditsha­ne is too big a village to be under just one Member of Parliament
FEELING THE HEAT: MP Tumiso Rakgare says Mogoditsha­ne is too big a village to be under just one Member of Parliament

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