Cost Implications Of A Project Appraisal Gone Awry: A Case Study Of Serowe Service Stadium In Botswana

Abstract

Due to stringent demands of Performance-Based Budgeting, coupled with chronic fiscal stresses that have been lately exacerbated by the ongoing global financial crisis in Botswana, there is an increasing pressure for high levels of accountability in the use of public funds. This, therefore, means that project appraisal is one of the critical stages in the project cycle to ensure the prudent husbandry of public finances. This paper, employing the case study method, uses the Serowe stadium to showcase project appraisal gone awry. Much against expert advice, the stadium was constructed on black cotton soil and is now being relocated at huge costs to the tax-payers. Importantly, the Serowe stadium debacle affirms the obvious; when rational analysis and politics collide, the latter, often, indeed almost always, wins. Despite this grim reality, to the extent possible, there is a need to curtail political interference from areas that are technical and, therefore, afford experts some degree of autonomy. Should this situation obtain, this will lead to rational and
cost-effective decisions being taken in the public sector.