Wilfred Mandlebe

Dr. Wilfred J. Mandlebe (PhD) is Botswana’s Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development, comes from Tutume village in the Central district.

He has worked for the Ministry for over twenty-seven (27) years, including six (6) years of secondment to the African Development Bank (AfDB) between 2007 and 2013. Before joining the Ministry in 1992, he worked for the Bank Of Botswana for seven (7) years from 1985 to 1992.

He holds a PhD in Public Policy, Master of Business Administration (MBA), Master of Arts (Economics), and Bachelor of Arts (Economics & Accounting). He has extensive experience in development planning and macroeconomic policy, having served in various capacities within the Ministry become Secretary for Economic Affairs and Secretary for Financial Affairs (2004 to 2007) (Permanent Secretary level) and Senior Policy Advisor (2013 -2019).

He also served in the boards of a number of state-owned enterprises in the country, including the chairmanship of boards of the Botswana Telecommunications Corporation (BTC) (2000 to 2005); Botswana Unified Revenue Service (BURS) (2005 to 2007); Botswana Building Society Board (BBS) (2006 to 2007); as well as a member of the boards of Botswana College of Distance and Open Learning (BOCODOL), now Botswana Open Univeristy, (1999 to 2001); Fairground Holdings, a BDC subsidiary (1999 to 2001); Botswana Export Development and Investment Authority (BEDIA)(2000 to 2002); Citizen Entrepreneurial Development Agency (CEDA) (2001 to 2007); Tertiary Education Council (2004 to 2007); and National Development Bank(NDB) (2005 to 2007). He also served as Botswana’s representative in the board of the African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF) (2000 to 2007); and an alternate on boards of Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) of the World Bank (1998 to 2007; African Development Bank (AfDB) (2003 to 2005); and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) (2005 to 2007).