Africa-Press – Botswana. Assistant Minister of Tertiary Education, Mr Justin Hunyepa has underscored the need for tertiary institutions to intensify their drive in forging partnerships and collaborations with the view to addressing challenges affecting their progress.
Mr Hunyepa said this during his ongoing institutional nation-wide tour, while responding to grievances from staff and students at Kang and Macheng brigades, where he had a chance to appreciate the teaching and learning infrastructure.
He advised the institutions to break the culture of working in silos, adding that it resulted in setbacks that limited progress and growth, an aspect which was rampant in most government institutions.
Mr Hunyepa called on the management to develop a practice of consulting and seeking assistance from other government departments, council and private sector when met with challenges , adding that it would enable them to find solutions to their challenges and further assist in facilitating their growth.
He said government was keen to ensure inclusivity and building of trust among stakeholders and establishing governance structures that supported collaboration.
“Government alone cannot manage to solve all the challenges. We therefore urge on collaborations and partnerships as it is only through working together that new solutions to the long lasting challenges will be created,” he said.
He therefore implored the staff to break all barriers that prohibited partnerships and open doors to have access to different sectors of government for assistance. Mr Hunyepa emphasised the need for educational institutions to find new ways of collaborating with each other so they could thrive together, adding that they should engage their other counterparts where they lack trade skills in order to prosper.
“Cross institutional partnership can help reshape the future of our education, fostering education and tackling challenges that institutions are unable to solve alone as they will work together seamlessly and achieve shared goals, at the same time providing trade skills experience to students,” he said.
He further said that the more the institutions collaborated, the more they were likely to address challenges that hindered progress.
He said government was profound at ensuring growth at the brigades and therefore advised them to introduce more programmes on the fields such as farming, solar energy, plumbing, pipe-fitting and borehole mechanics and ensure accreditation at BQA so they imparted more skills to the community.
Mr Hunyepa said the current government was human rights based and therefore engrossed at addressing workers rights, including wage increments, promotions and ensuring that they were accorded all their benefits. He said government was focused on revising the pay structure and ensuring that salaries were at par with the standards of living.
Mr Hunyepa noted that government was driving towards employing temporary lecturers and advised that management should hire where there were vacant posts in the establishment register.
Member of Parliament for Kgalagadi North, Mr Reason Lekhutlane thanked the assistant minister for getting first hand information about issues surrounding brigades at the earliest times of tenure in the office.
“There are so many challenges of lack of equipment and machinery, shortage of tools at workshops which require huge funds in order to be procured, notwithstanding staff welfare issues such as temporary lecturers, promotions and overstays so we are optimistic that through your visit, the issues will be addressed,” he said.
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