Africa-Press – Botswana. The media as the fourth arm of government has been urged to fully use its power of influence and guide the nation towards prosperity.
Conversing with public media in a Media Capacity Building Workshop in Gaborone on January 24, Chief of Staff at the Office of the President, Mr Boyce Sebetela, said the media had over the years proven to be a powerful force to reckon with in information dissemination as well as ability to persuade.
Mr Sebetela said the President, Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi’s Reset Agenda was an appeal to the nation, various stakeholders and individuals to retrospect, evaluate what they had been doing in developing their livelihoods with the view of igniting their efforts.
He advised that working as collective, interacting and sharing ideas was paramount in instigating change. He said it was important for individuals to value and understand their worth, brand themselves and contribute towards building strong family structures which were a foundation towards a united, resilient nation that was actively involved in building a strong and stable economy.
Mr Sebetela said for a family to contribute towards building a strong economy it must start with an individual. “A person is the creator of wealth,” he said. “The country’s economy emanates from an individual economy.”
Individuals who were not thinking of engaging in endeavors that added value to the economy of Botswana were deterrents of prosperity. He added that a nation must take pride in what individual citizens were doing to influence its growth. The Mindset Change and Reset Agenda, therefore, spoke to an individual.
“Stop explaining your failures and think about what you can do to change your life and add value to the economy. We must focus on building the individual,” he said.
Mr Sebetela said while focusing on their duty of informing and educating the nation, media practitioners and other support units to the industry must equally focus on nurturing the family.
“The foundation of how you behave and interact with one another emanate from the family. A Re Chencheng is not about introducing something new. It is all about re-visiting what used to work for us.
As you take the civilisation route take with you what used to work for you in the past,” he said.
He emphasised that a meaningful and worthy change would require collaboration. He said the media was a group of people that would understand better the need to drive the Mindset Change Campaign.
Mr Sebetela said the media must engage in driving the Mindset Change Campaign by continually publishing and broadcasting A Re Chencheng messages.
He said it was important for every individual to reset, bearing in mind that for the country to transition to high income economy it would not be driven by what has worked in achieving middle income economy. He said as the country was driving towards prosperity and a high-income economy by 2036, it was necessary for all to gear and engage in fast mode as 2036 was closing in.
“We need to introspect and change gear,” he said. “We want to move fast.”
What had taken Botswana to its current status needed a tweaking to achieve more within the 12 years that were left to get to 2036.
Mr Sebetela said growing and diversifying the economy would take productivity and innovation. As such, he said, past challenges must not be used to describe current failures.
Instead, he said, the challenges must ignite Batswana to come up with alternatives to engage and achieve more. He also said it was important for the work place culture to change and engage in working as a team. Mr Sebetela said it was unfortunate that excellence was deterred rather than getting the much-needed support and appreciation.
He added: “We belittle our best brains and waste time fighting and denying what will work best for us. Appreciate talent. Support talent.”
Mr Sebetela said the burning desire for change called for urgency.
“We are left with 12 years towards 2036, the year of prosperity for all and therefore had to change gear, increase our pace of movement. Our speed of doing things must double,” he said.
He said there was a prevailing mind set that was a deterrent towards achieving the national Vision in 2036. He said adopting the norm and ignoring the ingenuity and new ideas that were brought into work place by the young and new employees was a recipe for disasterHe said the nation and the workplace must be in a position to guide and nurture talent, as well as finding ways to engage one another and achieve more.
As such, Mr Sebetela said employees must initiate, be innovative towards an improved work environment and service to the nation.
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