“Distinguished heads of state and government, your excellencies members of the diplomatic corps, our invited guests, ladies and gentlemen, it is now my singular honour to call upon the next speaker to address the plenary. That speaker is none other than KK, the President of the Republic of Zambia and the Chairman of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU)”.
The speaker was Kenneth Kaunda himself inviting himself to the podium to address the OAU summit meeting at Africa Hall in Addis Ababa sometime in the mid-eighties. I was there covering the event for the Botswana Press Agency of the Department of Information and Broadcasting Services. I was particularly impressed by the way he called upon himself to address the plenary, hence my recollection. The style with which he introduced himself as the next speaker clearly shows that, in Kenneth Kaunda’s essence, there was a multiple of things among them, charisma, a sense of humour, confidence, difference and exciting and of course occasional flow of tears down the face. He was totally different from the rest of African leaders of that time. In the 70s, he shed tears when he opened the World Council of Churches conference in Lusaka. He shed tears again in Gaborone during the unveiling of Sir Seretse Khama statue. He had to be whisked away from the scene to the State House.
My recollection of him now takes me to Windhoek, Namibia during the independence of that country in 1990. Soon after that country attained independence, Frontline States leaders assembled to formally disband the mission which had been monitoring events leading to the independence. The first to arrive at the Mission’s offices was Sir Ketumile Masire followed by Kenneth Kaunda. It was a long wait as others were still to arrive. In the interim, Kenneth Kaunda sat quietly staring towards Samuel Mphuchane, Botswana’s foreign affairs secretary. Suddenly Kenneth Kaunda declared, “This man is wearing a beautiful combination, black suit, black tie, white shirt and white bearded face”. Sir Ketumie quipped, “Ken, how can you say that about our man. This man is our former High Commissioner to London. He is his Excellency’. Kenneth Kaunda then asked, “I see. Where he is excellencing now?” Replied Sir Ketumile, “he is in the control room of your excellencies”. The conversation ended with Kaunda saying, “That’s very good.” Again you can see from that conversation that Kaunda was a man who enjoyed talking to and teasing people around him. He disliked staying aloof and he enjoyed talking to people of all ages and different occupations. Samuel Mphuchane is now somewhere in the business industry. He used to be one of the directors at Trade World.
Even to his family, KK was a loving father. His son Kaweche told a mediatelevision channel in South Africa that, his father referred to his wife as his girl friend. He said he would walk into the house and asked about the whereabouts of “my girl friend”.
The other day he found me in a room at Gion Lalibela bungalows in Addis Ababa with Sir Ketumile. We had been expecting him but he arrived well ahead of the time he was due to arrive. I wanted to give way but he ordered me to return to my seat saying he too wished to interview a journalist. He knew very well that I was a member of Sir Ketumile’s press team and that I was present at a press conference he had earlier addressed. He asked me if he spoke sense at that press conference. That was how Kenneth Kaunda was. Following his death on June 17th, several countries across the Continent claimed him as one of them. All those countries, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Angola, Mozambique, Botswana which declared a seven day period of mourning and the flying of national flags at half mast and South Africa who declared ten days period of mourning were justified in claiming him as a great friend of them. As for Botswana, this is the only country in the world which Kenneth Kaunda regarded as his second home after Zambia.
Relationship between Botswana and Zambia dates back to the days of Sir Seretse Khama as Prime Minister and as President. Kenneth Kaunda was the first head of state to visit Botswana in 1968. That visit was a turning point in the relationship of the two countries. His country was the first in Africa to establish a diplomatic mission in Gaborone. During the 1968 visit, Kenneth Kaunda also visited Mochudi where he was hosted by Kgosi Linchwe ll. He delivered what was said to be the most powerful anti- apartheid speech which angered the Boers in South Africa. A pro-apartheid radio station in that country ran a commentary in the evening of the same day calling Kenneth Kaunda “a black dog” which “spent the whole day barking next to our border at Derdepoort”. Kenneth Kaunda knew several places in Botswana. He had been to the Tuli Block, Serowe, Kasane, Mochudi and Gaborone as well as Tlokweng. To Gaborone, the visits were countless. With Sir Seretse, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, Samora Machel of Mozambique they formed what became known as the Frontline States whose voice began being heard throughout the world. The group was formed to liberate Southern Africa. The quartet with Julius Nyerere their chairman, were on first term names. Sir Seretse was the only one with the title “Sir”. Therefore they simply called him Sir or “Chief”. Kaunda was “KK” Nyerere was “Mwalimu” while Machel was “Mos”. They were assisted later by what was known as the Contact Group consisting of United States, Canada, Germany, Britain and France. The Contact Group was active on the Angolan question but became redundant when the Ronald Reagan administration came in replacing the Jimmy Carter administration. At the level of the OAU, Frontline States and the United Nations, Botswana and Zambia had never in their history contradicted each other on any subject. They were always together when it was time for voting. Even when a matter was to be resolved by consensus, the pair sided with each other. If there was to be a split in the quartet, Zambia and Botswana would go together and likewise, Tanzania and Mozambique would go together. It remains unclear as to whether that was ideological or not.
In 1976, the OAU failed to resolve the issue of admission of the MPLA Government in Angola. The deadlock was referred to the Frontline States to break. They too failed to reach the consensus. Botswana and Zambia were against while Tanzania and Mozambique were of the view that the MPLA Government should be recognized. It appears Botswana and Zambia were for UNITA. After a protracted period of time and after several countries had individually decided to recognize the MPLA Government, Botswana announced a change of heart and recognized the MPLA as the governing party in Angola. Zambia followed up later. In fact Zambia had to wait until students at the University of Zambia rioted demanding the recognition of MPLA government by their government.
Botswana was also the first country to announce that it would not attend the OAU summit in Kampala, Uganda in 1974 under any circumstances. In the book, “Last to kill”, the rise and fall of Idi Amin, Sir Seretse condemned Amin’s disregard for the sanctity of human life and recalled that Amin had recently exhorted the armed forces of Botswana, Zambia, and Tanzania to overthrow their respective governments. Zambia, Tanzania and Mozambique followed suit. Tanzania also issued a statement condemning Idi Amin. In fact the statement issued by Tanzania was tougher than the one from Botswana. It read, “ Tanzania cannot accept the responsibility of participating in the mockery of condemning colonialism, apartheid and fascism in the headquarters of a murderer, an oppressor, a black fascist and self-confessed admirer of fascism.” During those years, Botswana and the Gambia were the only two in Africa which were multi-party democracy. The rest were either one party state or military ruled. Some military rulers had promoted themselves from the ranks of sergeants to lieutenants after taking over power.
Kenneth Kaunda can be remembered in many different ways. He was a committed struggle icon. Thabo Mbeki. Former South African President appeared in one of his country’s television channels paying a glorying tribute to Kaunda. He said for the ANC, Zambia was their home. Kaunda even housed the organization’s president, Oliver Tambo on the grounds of the Zambian state house. This means that, there was a state house within a state house. Mbeki recalled that, at that time when the ANC was waging war against the apartheid regime from Zambian soil, Zambia was surrounded by wars in the eastern, western and southern borders. It was Mozambique in the east, Angola in the west and Rhodesia in the south. Kenneth Kaunda was never derailed. He encouraged liberation movements to intensify their struggle while at the same time trying to angaged the white minority regimes especially those in South Africa head-on. In the 70s, he held talks with John Vorster at Victoria Falls and in the 80s he held another with P.W Botha on no man’s land near Tlokweng border. At each of those meetings, he tried to impress upon the apartheid leaders to abandon that policy. The Tlokweng meeting saw Botswana unleashing the biggest security ever provided to a head of state. It involved more than 100 BDF vehicles and perhaps more than 1000 personnel including civilians. The convoy started from the State House along Khama Crescent and cutting across Kaunda, Road and Nyerere Drive enroute to Tlokweng Road.
Kenneth Kaunda was said to have been a tough negotiator. Legends say Zimbabwean liberation movements led by Joshua Nkomo and the other by Robert Mugabe initially were reluctant to participate in the Lancaster House talks in London. They wanted to remain in the bush fighting. Kaunda, it is said, would have none of that. He appealed to them to participate but when Nkomo and Mugabe remained unmoved, Kaunda informed them in no uncertain terms that Frontline States would recognize the internal settlement and would also deny the two liberation movements the use of their territories (Frontline States) to stage a war against Rhodesia if they boycotted the talks. That tough stance is said to be the one which led to both Nkomo and Mugabe participating in the Lancaster House talks.
In 1990, President Masire flew into Lusaka, Zambia for a one day working visit. No communiqué was issued after the talks but a week later, Kenneth Kaunda announced that his country would switch from one party state to multi-party democracy with immediate effect. The following year, Kaunda was defeated in the general election in which an opposition party contested. Frederick Chiluba’s MDC which had the enticing slogan, “The hour has come”, won. One of Chiluba’s first visit abroad as president was to Botswana where he seemingly boasted to Masire saying, “Mr. President, your friend is in good hands, Mr President, we are not harassing your friend. Despite what he did to us over the years, Mr. President your friend is safe. We are looking after him. I am assuring you Mr President that your friend is in good hands”. The Zambian national soccer team was affectionately called “KK Eleven”. However, that name soon ceased from ever being heard even though the new administration was “not harassing Masire’s friend.”
