Rustenburg - Botswana President Mokgweetsi Masisi will ask parliament to have the state of emergency to be in effect for six months, he said on Monday.
"A very major decision has been taken...you aware because it is in the public domain - the declaration of the state of public emergency," he told leaders of political parties in a televised address in Gaborone before they went into a closed meeting.
"And before we go and debate it in parliament because I have chosen to invoke the provision as in the constitution to call parliament because we are asking for something more than the presidents in their own right can do – the endorsement by parliament following a robust debate or indeed if they so choose a rejection by parliament of what we asked for...the reason for asking for the state of emergency to be in existence for six months."
He said Botswana's best defence against Covid-19 was a robust preventative strategy.
Botswana has recorded six confirmed cases of Covid-19 and one death. One of the confirmed cases was a local transmitted one.
Masisi declared a lockdown for 28 days in an attempt to stop the spread of Covid-19, from April 2, to April 30.
Masisi himself was put in self-isolation following his visit to Namibia to attended the inauguration of Namibian President Hage Geingob in Windhoek on March 21.
He was released from quarantine after he tested negative for Covid-19.
The Covid-19 was first record in Wuhan, China in December of 2019, it spill-over to other part of the world and to date there were more than 1.3 million confirmed cases worldwide with over 70,000 deaths.