Maseru, March 02 — The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Relations has advised itself to dispose-off its property based in Johannesburg, South Africa (SA) as it does not contribute significantly to expected revenue.
This was disclosed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Relations Mr. Lejone Mpotjoane before the Portfolio Committee on the Prime Minister’s Ministries and Departments, Governance, Foreign Relations and Information Cluster, when engaging on the 2026/2027 annual budget consultations.
He said although they have engaged the Ministry of Public Works and Transport to assist in this process, they are due to make further consultations and make a decision thereafter as the Ministry of Public Works as well as that of Finance are the ones responsible for selling and buying property.
He indicated that tenants are not honouring their contracts as they are not paying rent as expected, indicating that the Ministry had to send its team for monitoring and mapping the way forward as the property is also dilapidated.
On the other hand, the Principal Secretary in the same Ministry, Mr. Thabang Lekhela elaborated that the tenants contracts were previously terminated in a bid to refurbish the property but they did not evacuate the place thus new contracts had to be issued.
He indicated that the tenants are paying rent into the Johannesburg Consulate Account and each pay M958 per month, indicating that the Ministry collected only M307, 000 in 2025/2026 financial year instead of the expected M598, 000 due to tenants who claimed they did not know where to deposit the money while others did not have contracts and that some rooms were unoccupied.
However, he said after the Ministry sent its team to monitor the property, they saw an increase in the money collected for rent, emphasising the need to monitor on a regular basis.
Asked why they did not find an agent who would manage and collect rent on behalf of the Ministry, he said they did that previously but there was no transparency.
“It was more effective when we collected rent ourselves than when we engaged an Agency,” he said.
In another issue, the Ministry revealed that it sold three vehicles, two from Lesotho-Berlin Mission and one from Lesotho-Dublin as they had depreciated and were expensive to maintain, indicating that they also bought one for Lesotho Mission based in Washington.
Meanwhile the Agency has learnt that the Ministry intended to collect M200,000 from sold vehicles and disposed equipment but only collected M126, 000.
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