Of the 34 parliamentary seats contested at the 1989 general elections, the Botswana National Front (BNF), the major opposition party at the time, got 3 seats or less than 9% of the total seats. It was the fifth straight landslide victory for the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP). Twenty-eight years after Independence and five electoral defeats, state power seemed beyond reach for the BNF.
However, at the next general elections in 1994, the outcome was different. the BNF won an unprecedented 13 seats out of a total of 40 seats or about 33% of the seats. Never before had the BDP attained less than 68% of the elected seats and less than 54% of the popular vote. The mood was sombre at the BDP. The BNF was, however, in cloud nine; its supporters euphoric. For the first time, there was a real chance of dethroning the BDP at the next general elections – the BNF could smell blood.
But as fate would have it, the opposition party imploded spectacularly, to the relief of the BDP. Factionalism that had been bedevilling the BNF, led by Dr Kenneth Koma, exploded into the open and tore the opposition party apart, a year before the general elections. The internal strife sprang from complaints by the largely anti-Koma central committee about Dr Koma’s leadership qualities.
At the BNF national congress held at Palapye in 1998, violence erupted between the pro-Koma and the anti-Koma factions. At the gathering, the central committee suspended the party president. He then took the matter to court where the judge ruled that the central committee did not have the authority to suspend Dr Koma. He then purged his opponents by establishing a ‘caretaker committee’ to replace the central committee. Soon afterwards, the anti-Koma faction walked out of the BNF with 11 parliamentarians and the majority of councillors to establish a new opposition party. Thus, the BCP was born.
Since then, it has been a downward spiral for the opposition collective in terms of parliamentary seats. At the next general elections in 1999, the BNF received a paltry 6 seats and the BCP only 1 seat. The BNF split rewarded the BDP with 33 seats or 83% of the contested seats. The 1994 feat was never to be repeated; it was the only time that a single opposition party had an opportunity to oust the ruling party, had sane minds prevailed at the BNF national congress of 1998.
After the major split of the BNF, electoral alliances of sorts were formed with other minor opposition parties separately by the BNF and the BCP, with the two unsuccessfully negotiating an alliance in 2005. However, ousting the BDP from power remained a pipe dream without the BNF and BCP, the country’s biggest opposition parties, joining forces.
Then enters the Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC), an opposition coalition party established in 2012 by the BNF, BCP, Botswana People’s Party (BPP) and Botswana Movement for Democracy (BMD), a BDP splinter party. The UDC was led by the BNF president as it is now. However, owing to disagreements with the UDC, the BCP pulled out of the coalition to contest the 2014 general elections on its own.
The opposition collective fared badly at the general elections, getting only 33% of the contested seats, the same got by the BNF 20 years earlier before it split into two. Given the huge support the civic society including trade unions gave the UDC, the BDP would have probably lost the 2014 general elections had BCP been part of the coalition.
It was not until the 2019 general elections that the BNF and the BCP joined forces for the first time. Having been humiliated at the ballot in 2014, garnering only 6% of parliamentary seats with its president losing his seat, the BCP decided to be part of the UDC to contest the elections.
In 2017, following the expulsion of the BMD president and other executive members, the party held an elective congress in Bobonong, which turned violent as warring factions battled each other. Consequently, the expelled members of the BMD formed the Alliance for Progressives (AP). Most of the BMD supporters switched allegiance to the new party.
The AP refused to join the UDC that had the BMD. As a result of issues pertaining to the allocation of constituency seats, the BMD was expelled from the opposition coalition before the 2019 general elections. Thus, the UDC went into the elections without the BMD and the AP.
At the elections, the UDC managed to win only 26% of the seats and its president lost his seat. The loss was stunning because the biggest opposition parties had joined forces for the elections, and the BDP had shed support to splinter parties and lost its Central District heartland in the process. The BDP splinter parties bagged 7% of the seats. With 67% of the seats won, the BDP notched its ninth straight win against the opposition.
Smarting from their defeat at the 2019 general elections, major opposition parties signed a memorandum of agreement individually with the UDC not to compete against each other in by-elections that would occur before the next general elections in 2024. The UDC is also courting the AP and BPF to join the opposition coalition in preparation for the general elections.
Today, the relationship between the UDC and the BCP, is acrimonious. The latter has expressed its unhappiness with the manner with which the UDC is being run. Just as it did in 1998, when the central committee complained about the leadership qualities of the then president of the BNF before forming the BCP, today the party is publicly deploring the abilities of the UDC president, saying the coalition lacks good governance.
By virtue of the fact that the UDC president is also the BNF president, the BCP is sceptical of decisions taken by the UDC (which now consist of the BNF, BCP and BPP). It insists that the opposition coalition is biased against it, and accuses the BNF and the BPP of always ganging against it at the coalition’s national executive committee meetings. Consequently, the BCP has threatened to quit the coalition and join forces with the AP, a party whose ideals it says it supports.
The BCP’s main grievance is that the UDC has not held an elective national congress to elect a new leadership since its formation, and are calling for one. However, the UDC says that an elective congress will be held after the conclusion of talks with the AP and BPF. The BCP states that it wants an elective congress because it is in line with good governance and the UDC constitution. Sceptics, however, suggest that the BCP is keen on an elective congress because it believes it can topple the BNF from the UDC presidency.
Indeed, although in parliament they are members of the UDC, the majority of opposition MPs belong to the BCP. Consequently, the BCP president was made leader of the opposition in parliament (LOO) after the 2019 general elections. This has given the party more visibility than the BNF, especially in light of the public broadcasting of parliament proceedings.
The internal feud in the opposition coalition played itself out at the recent by-election in Bophirima Ward, where the BCP fielded its own candidate against that of the UDC. The AP was an integral part of the BCP campaign at Bophirima – in fact, the presidents of the two parties conducted house to house campaigns together. The ward was, however, eventually won by the UDC.
The BCP has been asked by the umbrella to apologise for disparaging the UDC leadership in public. The BCP is yet to apologise, and it is unclear what the consequences would be if an apology is not issued. The relationship between the two is such that the BCP is currently grappling with the decision to quit the UDC or to stay put.
The Bophirima by-election presented the BCP with schisms hitherto unknown. Members were divided between the BCP candidate and the UDC candidate. Some BCP parliamentarians defied the leadership’s instruction to campaign for the party candidate. Apparently, the defiant MPs believe that they are better off staying within the opposition coalition.
Presumably in order to increase its electoral success, the UDC recently encouraged affiliate parties not to subject incumbent MPs and councillors to primary elections. This will put a wedge between incumbents and parties that opt for primary elections for all its members, such as the BCP, which is against the suggestion because it says it is against the ethos of good governance.
If the BCP quits the opposition coalition it would result in by-elections for constituencies of BCP MPs who will also leave the coalition in solidarity. Since there is no guarantee that they will be elected back to parliament, only a few BCP MPs, if any, would dare leave the coalition. Thus, for its own survival, the BCP will have to stay in the UDC. Leaving the coalition would tear the party apart and render it a mere shadow of itself. Besides, as Bophirima by-election has demonstrated, teaming up with the AP only is not politically astute.
Going forward, the BCP has to be alive to the fact that the UDC, with the flaws it has alluded to, is the only viable opposition vehicle for attaining state power in 2024. The BCP has to be smart, courageous, swallow its pride, compromise on its ideals and smoke a peace pipe with the UDC. It has to forgo its public rhetoric about the UDC leadership, and shelf its ambition of taking over the UDC presidency, if indeed it exists. The party should focus on building the opposition coalition because chances of it successfully standing for the 2024 general elections outside the coalition are close to nil. If, upon joining the UDC before the 2019 elections, the BCP did not negotiate an acceptable arrangement with the umbrella, it is now too late to renegotiate a more suitable partnership before the next general elections. Most importantly, good governance should not trump the raison d’être of a political party, which is the attainment of state power.
