After victoriously delivering a petition at the Ministry of Education decrying the appalling quality of education by some private tertiary institutions, the BCP Youth League watched staggering reactions from a number of players, at the Ministry of Education, tertiary institutions, SRC’s, the media and the public.
In our observation, we concluded that the current crisis at the Ministry of Education is tremendously deeper than the public may discern.
After carefully observing Minister Nkate’s reaction (where he is always quick to say Government will continue to do business with these private tertiary schools), BCP Youth League has concluded that the public must be allowed to know the truth about corruption allegations made against Minister Nkate.
The public has called for Nkate’s resignation.
BCP Youth League disagrees with Nkate’s assertion that he is an asset in government because it is under his leadership as the Minister of Education that Botswana saw a huge increase in the number of unemployed graduates, that Botswana’s second university’s (BIUST) enrolment has been postponed many times, from 2007, then 2009 and now it is 2012, that a private tertiary institution can admit over 11┬á000 students against the authorised 7┬á500 students intake and that billions of Pula’s can be misappropriated to sponsor ghosts students.
BCP Youth League is worried that Minister Nkate seems to be hiding a lot from the public and he is also hiding behind the DCEC’s hoax investigations going on at the Ministry of Education. Why is Minister Nkate always jumping to say DCEC is camping at his Ministry doing some investigation whenever he is asked to resign and clear his name?
DCEC cannot investigate while Nkate is still sitting as the Minister of Education. It will be a futile exercise and a waste of public funds.
We contend that Minister Nkate is implicated here as the main culprit and the obligation rests with him to clear his name before a commission of inquiry unto all the corruption allegations raised by the public and members of Parliament. The public has a right to know if it is true Minister Nkate do pocket money and receive some gifts from some of these tertiary institutions for his personal benefit at the cost of the public interest? So any investigation must be done with Nkate not being the Minister to avoid any interruption and stage managing of the investigations.
We maintain that Minister Nkate has a public responsibility to clear his name from these many corruption allegations especially because he is the Secretary General of the ruling party that wishes to portray itself as not tolerating corruption.
Maintaining that President Khama has a duty to protect the image of his government and that of Botswana as anti-corruption nation, we as BCP Youth League call upon him (President Khama) to institute a commission of enquiry to investigate corruption allegations against Minister Nkate raised by MPs and the members of the public and let Minister Nkate clear his name. We feel that Nkate’s continued service as Minister of Education is not healthy for future generations as we continue to witness the delivery of unsatisfactory tertiary education that produces unemployable graduates. Thus Nkate must resign and clear his name before the commission of enquiry that will also be open for various parties such as the students, Ministry of Education employees and the members of the public to testify and give evidence. Surely we cannot turn a blind eye when billions of Pula are spent recklessly at the Ministry of Education while Batswana continue to starve. We call upon BNYC and other NGOs to let the public know their position on this issue just like they did with Zimbabwe.
Manyapetsa is President of the BCP Youth League
