Botswana: Communities surrounding Ligowe Health Center in Traditional Authority Mlauli in Neno District have asked for better health facilities. The communities have appealed District Health Office to deploy an additional clinician at the facility.
According to the members of the community, this will help significantly in improving service delivery in the Traditional Authority. The Chairperson of the Community Voice and Action group, Damiano Khosomani made the call on Tuesday.
He was at the time, attending during an interface meeting organized by the National Initiative for Civic Education (NICE) Trust. The trust falls under the three-year Boma Lathu project, funded by the European Union.
He stated that the health facility currently has only one clinician which strains service delivery due to the high number of patients.
“We have only one clinician here which results in patients spending more time in the queue before receiving assistance,” Khosomani said.
He added that patients are forced to go through prolonged waiting times at the hospital. This is because the single hospital serves more than 15 villages.
Chairperson of Mlauli Area Development Committee (ADC), Yasintha Kafaniza noted that staff shortage forces the clinician to work long hours, compromising the quality of care provided due to fatigue.
In response, District Health Office (DHO) representative Henderson Mitepa announced that an additional clinician will be deployed to the health center to enhance staff capacity.
“Ligowe Health Centre has been assigned one more clinician to strengthen the team and address the staffing gap, making it the only health centre in the district with two clinicians,” he said.
NICE District Programmes Officer for Neno, Walace Kudzala explained that the interface meeting was aimed at providing a platform for citizens and marginalized groups to voice their challenges to the duty bearers and for the duty bearers to respond to their obligations.
“It is the responsibility of communities to demand their rights and ensure transparency and accountability,” Kudzala said.
He highlighted that there is often a lack of accountability from duty bearers in service delivery and limited responsiveness to community concerns.
Traditional Authority Mlauli expressed gratitude to NICE for organizing the interface, stating that it offered a valuable forum for resolving community issues with the relevant authorities.