Lesotho to fork out M2.4 million for hosting its home game in SA
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By Staff Reporter
Former Sports Minister Mahali Phamotse today took a swipe at Prime Minister Moeketsi Majoro accusing him of failing to rein in his Minister of Sports LIkeleli Tampane who will be paying M2.4 million for each national team [Likuena] game hosted in South Africa.
Phamotse, speaking during a debate of the motion for a vote of no confidence in the Prime Minister Majoro said national sports events have been an embarrassment to the nation.
She alleged, “as we speak today, Likuena will have to pay M2.4 million to play its home games in South African Stadiums” owing to the “incompetence” of Minister Tampane.
“Likuena is now going to be playing at the Dobsonville Stadium in South Africa. The 2.4 million is going to be spent on each match. And when it plays with Seychelles it has to accommodate the teams it is hosting and pay for all their expenses00.
“The Prime Minister fought tooth and nail not to build the sports facilities that would ensure that we have the capability to host our national team games locally. If we could count how much we are going to lose from our national team games being hosted in another country [South Africa] it is a lot of money. Likeleli stop crying. You are inept and unable to do your job,” said Phamotse.
Phamotse further made a critical remark against Prime Minister Majoro’s government saying there is a youth Policy that should be implemented to create employment for the youths.
But the former minister said minister Tampane is always crying foul and not doing her job as she should.
Phamotse said Prime Minister Majoro is unable to take to task his ministers.
“There is a lot of incompetence in Prime Minister Majoro’s cabinet,” said Phamotse.
The former Sports minister who is also the Alliance of Democrats Secretary-General said she would like to see Prime Minister Majoro removed from office for failing to contain the erosion of funds from Lesotho to other countries.
“Why is there so much erosion of funds to another country when we could have built our own sports facilities in order to ensure that the money is spent in our country and not in another country. This is sheer incompetence on the part of the Prime Minister.
“The Prime Minister has brought all youth projects that are meant to create youth jobs to his office, and he is using these projects for his own political ambitions and people are hired based on their political affiliations. So much of our resources will be spent in our neighbour’s country,” said Phamotse.
She added that Likuena has gone to South Africa without its coach just because Minister Tampane is unable to provide an instrument that would enable new Likuena Coach ease of travel and be able to cross the border with his team to a Match in South Africa.
“Other issues that we thought would be resolved by Prime Minister Moeketsi Majoro is the problems within the police service. There are no resources for the police service.
“There are also many problems caused by a feud between the police service and the police association.
“Also, the army is also in trouble as the soldiers here in Lesotho go without food and that will cause this country many problems.’
The manner in which the Prime Minister handling the security issues in the country is appalling and cause for concern and say he is not fit for office,” said Mahali.
She further said the country is faced with many problems of gender-based violence and it’s continuing to escalate without the Prime Minister making any strides to bring it to an end.
“We continue to see murders escalate. Some of the gangs are associated with the incumbent government but there is nothing being done to bring them to order. These gangs are heavily armed and there are no strides by the Office of the Prime Minister engage their leaders and bring murders to an end,” said Mahali.
