A protracted standoff between the Executive Director of Botswana National Youth Council, Ben Raletsatsi, on one hand and the Board of Directors on the other has scared off a number of flagship funders who had already committed to funding BNYC, Sunday Standard can confirm.
One such funder that had committed for a long term partnership with BNYC is the World Bank.
The Washington based financier had identified a number of BNYC projects that were going to be funded.
The relationship has since been put on a hold.
Raletsatsi was suspended five months ago and his matter has still not been resolved.
While he has been on suspension almost for half the year, he continues to draw a full salary from BNYC.
Among other things Raletsatsi has been charged with unilaterally taking a decision to employ executives at BNYC without the explicit authority of the Board and also increasing salaries for some staff members of the Council.
He disputes the charge and alleges that the Board was meddling in the operational duties of the Council.
Other than that BNYC has been going on without substantive Executive Director for five months, Sunday Standard can also confirm that the Council faces a number of litigation suits, including from officers who have had their salaries and perked cut by the Board because it is alleged Raletsatsi had unilaterally employed such officers.
“People read about BNYC on the papers and they have no idea that the situation is actually much worse. Nothing is functional as all the time and energies are now directed at fighting the battles between the Board and the suspended Executive Director,” said an employee who did not want named for fear of rubbing the Board the wrong way.
While Board has said it is taking action against Raletsatsi because of maladministration non his part, Sunday standard has come across emails which go a long way to prove that long before Raletsatsi was suspended, some members of the Board had been colluding with Raletsatsi’s juniors to hatch a number of trumped up charges against the Executive Director.
In one of the emails, a Board member asks one of BNYC to help find anything that could be used to charge Raletsatsi.
“Authorising a capacity building strategy to be done not going through all procurement processes, employing an expatriate volunteer with no policy in place, getting laptops and contract phones for Peace Corps….. Ahhh there are so many. Let me know if these make sense, maybe I’m just angry,” said a reply from the officer.
Further emails show that relations between Raletsatsi and the Board started to go sour after he tried to discipline yet another officer, who was also having a cozy relationship with the board.
Among other things Raletsatsi charged the said employee with failing to declare her interest in a bid which saw property owned by her mother rented to BNYC.
“Sometime in February 2012 you recommended for my approval a lease of agreement for the Kanye office and failed and or neglected to declare your interest since the owner of the property is your mother,” charged Raletsatsi.
