TWO DIE IN FIERCE FIRE
Two peope have died and two others were severely injured in a fierce inferno that gutted a teacher’s house to the ground in Kalakamati village on Friday morning.
Sleeping in the two bed -roomed house were the Kalamati Primary School teacher, her mother, her two children and her 10-year-old relative.
At around 2am, Tshweneng ward community woke up to piercing screams of frightened occupants of the burning house and immediately started putting out the fire, although too much damage was already done.
Police are yet to figure out the cause of the fire. Detective Assistant Superintendent, Obakeng Manewe, told The Voice in an interview that they got the report of a burning house in the early morning hours of Friday.
“All the people in the house were taken to Masunga hospital where the 74-year-old woman [mother to the teacher] was certified dead on arrival and the 19year-old girl [teacher’s daughter] was referred to Nyangabgwe Hospital where she later succumbed to her injuries.
The 51-year-old teacher and her 13-year-old child are still fighting for their lives at Masunga Hospital while the 10-year-old relative was discharged as he escaped unscathed.
“Although we have not yet put an amount to the damaged property, we can confirm that nothing was retrieved from the sitting room where the fire seems to have emanated and the ceiling was badly burnt,” Manewe said.
A ZIMBABWEAN man who allegedly abandoned his 13-year-old son, leaving the teenager to fend for himself for 19 days, has been arrested.
38-year-old Delezi Tiyapo Dube is charged with neglecting and illtreating his child, who was found wandering the streets of Tonota scavenging for food.
It is alleged that from 30th January to 18th February, despite being the child’s immediate guardian, Dube left his son at home unattended. The unemployed father was reportedly moving between cattleposts on the outskirts of Tonota in search of piece jobs.
Appearing before Francistown Magistrates’ Court on Monday, looking slightly dishevelled and a little confused, Dube was also charged with being in the country illegally.
He did not enter a plea and was remanded in custody, with his case adjourned until 8th March.
Meanwhile, Tonota Station Commander, Oteng Ngada, told The Voice his officers arrested Dube last Thursday.
“Sometime back, members of the public picked up a stray boy near Take No Time shop and handed him to the police on suspicion that he was lost. However, our preliminary investigations suggest he was abandoned,” revealed the top cop, adding the boy is not enrolled in any school.
According to Ngada, it appears father and son have been living together for some time after the boy’s mother was deported to Zimbabwe roughly five years ago.
The child has since been taken into care at SOS Children’s Village in Francistown.
“It is the first case we registered of a foreigner ill-treating a child,” closed Ngada.
I am in need of your assistance. I bought a service from a company for installation of a solar system for an amount of P27,500.
This was on December 15th. The system has never worked not even once since installation. These guys have been trying to get it running up to today. They are failing dismally. So, today I asked for my money back since the system is not working. They guy is saying he can only refund P26,000 instead of P27,500. He says he is covering his costs of going to the site many times. But who’s fault is it? It’s supposed to be his because he offered me a service that never worked so I want my money back.
Kindly advice on what to do to get my full refund back.
I think you should tell him exactly what you’ve told me. You paid for a working solar system and that is exactly what you’re entitled to get. Or, if there’s a problem, you’re entitled to a refund. An entire refund. Not a partial refund. I don’t care if he had to “travel to the site many times”. That really is his problem, not yours.
Section 7 (6) and (7) of the Consumer Protection Act says that when “goods or services are not availed as advertised, the consumer shall have the right to cancel the contract (and) the supplier shall refund the consumer the amount paid”.
I suspect that this guy sold you a solar power system that he suggested would work properly? He failed.
Maybe you should also tell him that Section 15 (1) of the Act says that a consumer “has the right to receive goods which are of good quality, in good working order and free of defects”.
This guy owes you P27,500. And an apology for saying silly things.
In their efforts to promote crop production, the Ministry of Agricultural Development and Food Security has come up with initiatives to match respective crop products to the compatible production environments.
This was revealed by the Minister of Agricultural Development and Food Security, Karabo Gare, in response to a question posed by Jwaneng/mabutsane MP, Mephato Reatile, in parliament recently.
Gare explained that through the Ministry’s Department of Agricultural Research, they have undertaken rigorous investigations through purposeful studies on crop sustainability in various zones of the country.
He noted that in this undertaking, observations were focused on dissimilarities among the zones in terms of soils, temperatures and annual precipitation.
“Observations were furthermore based on variability among crop types and varieties.”
He said that through this exercise, the Ministry has come up with agro-ecological zones for Botswana, guiding on suitable crop varieties for various locations.
Gare mentioned that Kgalagadi sandy soils have been found to be suitable for production of pulses such as cowpeas, beans and other drought tolerant and highly adaptive crops due to comparatively lower annual rainfalls and adverse temperatures.
“The Ministry has developed relevant extension messages which are conveyed to the farming com
munities through different information sharing platforms such as Farmer/agricultural Demonstrator interaction, television and radio.”
Describing the approach as a ‘noble one’, Gare noted it would enable optimum exploitation of both the crops as well as the different environment within which they are produced.
“This is the basis from which commodity clusters have been developed,” he added.
Reatile had asked the Minister to explain whether any studies to determine common crops that do well in Kgalagadi or sandy environments have been conducted. He also asked the Minister to state if there are any promotional activities to encourage residents to focus on these crops looking at their potential economic output.