Botswana: The 2023 Edition of the Botswana Prison Service Senior Officers Conference has commenced under the theme ‘Building a High-Performance Culture: Repositioning, Realigning, Re-Engineering the Prison Service to achieve its mandate’.
Giving a tone-setting speech in Selibe Phikwe yesterday, Commissioner of Prisons Dinah Marathe has implored Botswana Prison Service Senior Management to ensure that the programmes and priorities of the Service are aligned with the Government Agenda. She said building a high-performance culture is the cornerstone of improving service delivery, hence the need to; Reposition, Realign and Re-engineer the processes.
She highlighted that the delivery of the organisational mandate remains a core responsibility and the reason for Prison Service’s existence. She expressed trust that given the level of commitment, Officers have demonstrated in the past, there is no doubt that the mandate can be effectively achieved.
With a view to enhancing delivery on projects, the Commissioner emphasised that the Government has introduced the Transitional National Development Plan (TNDP), through which all the Departments are expected to ensure efficient delivery on all projects, as well as ensuring quality delivery of services to Batswana. She, therefore, urged officers to speed up procurement activities to fast-track the implementation of the planned projects for the transition period.
Talking about the alignment to the Reset Agenda, the Commissioner pointed out that Senior Officers were trained on Mindset Change, with the intention to roll it down to the lower ranks. She said that the training has inculcated a shift in the way Officers think and perform their duties, which is very critical in effective service delivery.
She added that officers’ training and education should be a form of return on investment; hence all should deposit the knowledge and skills acquired in one basket. “People will only deposit if we are focused and providing direction as the leadership,” she advised.
The Commissioner further implored the participants to adopt wellness mechanisms which include regular exercise, training and healthy eating, to ensure that they are fit for duty at all times. “We shall in the near future design training programmes aimed at fostering fitness in order to enable us to respond to emergencies as and when required as duty requires that we are physically and mentally fit at all times,” she said.
She urged all to approach the Conference with open minds, knowing very well that past performance has a significant bearing on current and future performance.
The Conference will be officially opened by the Minister of Defence and Security Thomas Kagiso Mmusi tomorrow (22 February 2023).