The Ministry of Finance and Development Planning has decided to outsource the preparation and coordination of National Development Plan 10.
This was said by the Assistant Minister of Finance when answering a question by Gaborone South Member of Parliament, Akanyang Magama.
The Minister said the British consultants engaged are called Mokoro Ltd.
They will cost in excess of P3 million (US$ 529 452) over a period of 22 months.
The minister said they engaged foreign consultants after the Ministry found out that they did not have the capacity to prepare the Plan.
“I should state that initially my ministry considered coordinating NDP 10 preparation in-house, just like what was done with the preparation of the mid-term Reviews of NDP 8 and 9.
However, this was not possible due to limited capacity and time constraints of experienced staff of the Ministry to do the full work on full time basis.”
He said the Ministry then approached the Bank of Botswana “who also had capacity constraints and could not release anyone on a fulltime basis.”
It was then that the Ministry approached BIDPA (Botswana Institute for Development Policy Analysis) “to either assist or recruit qualified personnel for NDP 10 coordination.
BIDPA could not make an expert available in-house.
“Since BIDPA could not make an expert available in-house, they, through their database, contracted Mokoro Ltd on behalf of the Ministry to provide two experts to assist in the coordination over a period of 22 months.”
The Minister said both of the experts have previously worked in Botswana; one at the Ministry of Finance, the University of Botswana and BIDPA while the other has previously worked at the Ministry of Agriculture.
But still Members of Parliament were not impressed even when the Minister tried to allay their fears that a senior government official will chair the multi sectoral committee comprising the trade unions, Bank of Botswana, University of Botswana, Private Sector and BIDPA.
