A lesson from the Minister

The Botswana Daily News of 30 August carried a front page story about a visit to Kasane, in the far north of the country, by the Assistant Minister for Public Administration, Mr. Masisi. The Minister told residents that they could help to eradicate poverty by ceasing to expect handouts from government and that they should become more autonomous by setting up businesses such as bee keeping, vegetable production and fishery, "among others".

The residents responded that they found it difficult to make a living in such a fashion because there was a chronic water shortage in Kasane so vegetables didn't grow, while requests to government for new plots of land took more than five years to clear; they also had problems with wild animals and annual floods destroying any crops they planted. The Minister answered these objections by saying that residents should irrigate their back yards "with used household water and to desist from washing their cars using hosepipes in order to save water". So there. Just how many Kasane residents actually own cars isn't stated; and the journalist's personal views on the Minister's advice are not given.

Gabarone

I had a quick business trip to Botswana - the capital, Gabarone, is just down the road by African standards - a mere 50 minute flight. Botswana is one of the success stories of the continent - the fastest growing economy in the world from 1966 to 2005, mainly due to the discovery of diamonds - but more than that, a governing class that resisted the robber baron mentality of many of their neighbours and ploughed a lot of that wealth into schools, hospitals, and employment. In 1970 GDP per head was 200 dollars, only 2% of the population completed elementary school, there were 100 University students, and there was a single paved road 12 kilometres long. Now the GDP is over 14,000 dollars per head and adult literacy is now 74% against a subSaharan average of 58%. There is also very little crime, a wonderful and relaxing contrast to Botswana's delinquent southern neighbour. However, there are some big clouds on the horizon - the diamond fields are expected to dry up within ten or fifteen years, there's very little other industry to speak of, and arable land is a mere 0.7% of the total - most of the territory is dominated by the Kalahari desert.

I didn't see much of Botswana - just the road from the airport and the pedestrian street in the centre - the latter, oddly enough, reminded me of the pedestrian areas in provincial Eastern European towns: grim institutional architecture, large open spaces covered in large flagstones with no provision for trees, and people using these spaces to sell a motley variety of goods, from shoes to vegetables to CDs to crafts to clothing - but with no attempt at pressure salesmanship or indeed any salesmanship at all - take it or leave it; this is also relaxing and refreshing.