The Umbrella for Democratic Change faces its grimmest future since it was created around 2011.
The party is gripped by fatalism.
And clearly it is unable to wash it off.
The recent by-election in Bophirima ward will forever be remembered as a straw that broke the camel’s back.
After what preceded that by-election it is extremely unlikely that the BCP will be part of the UDC going into the 2024 General Elections.
But to be sure, the departure of BCP from the UDC was long in coming.
In fact the outcome of the BCP elective congress made that departure inevitable.
Since that congress the party was forever on a hunt for a pretext to leave.
Bophirima by-election presented itself as just that alibi.
Now inside the BCP internal agitation is gaining pace.
And so too is frustration – with UDC but also with the leadership.
With UDC because they still regard it as a natural opponent.
And with leadership because there is no clear path to leave.
Still things are moving ever faster, with a scheduled leadership forum already expected to make a preemptive strike in the near future.
The BCP was supposed to be a founding member of the UDC.
In the end the party opted out.
It was the outcome of the 2014 General Elections that literally dragged BCP into UDC, principally to save itself from the ruling party onslaught.
At the time UDC leader, Duma Boko staked everything – against all advice, into fast-tracking the entrance of the Botswana Congress Party into the UDC.
He moved hills to bring the BCP into the UDC.
As a result the BCP had a lion’s share of constituencies going into the 2019 elections, chiefly because at the negotiations table the UDC negotiated as one party even though there were no less than three parties under the umbrella.
Boko broke all the rules and made all sorts of silly concessions and compromises that in the end literally risked his position inside his Botswana National Front.
But for him the lure of state power was too much for any consideration.
And the BCP according to him held the key to state power.
In the end, as he became personally close to BCP leader Dumelang Saleshando he lost his long time ally and trusted lieutenant Ndaba Gaolathe, formerly of the Botswana Movement for Democracy, now leader of the Alliance for Progressives.
It is only a matter of time before BCP officially leaves the UDC.
In fact a bigger hindrance for them is no longer a fear of being punished by the voters as it happened in 2014. A prospect of a split is there, but remote.
Rather it is a law that now effectively outlaws floor-crossing.
All BCP members of parliament are recognised as UDC.
If they leave the party on their own, there will effectively be by elections.
Democratising the UDC is fundamentally crucial.
And the BCP will continue to use the lack of internal democracy as a pretext – until the end.
It is Duma Boko’s scalp that they are after.
They want absolute control of the UDC – to take it over and get it submerged within, the same way they did with Botswana Alliance Movement and MELS.
At the moment the most powerful person inside the BCP is Taolo Lucas.
An entire team of his electoral slate made it into the BCP Central Committee.
Over and above that Lucas has a huge swath of influence inside the BCP.
Officially he is vice president of the BCP. Practically his power makes him something else.
To him the UDC is a waste of time. It always has been!
From the beginning he was dead set against the BCP joining the UDC.
When the party ultimately joined the UDC he was made a member of the National Executive Committee, but to demonstrate his contempt for the project he resigned shortly thereafter.
He controls the BCP not just through a strong grip on structures, but also through a vast swath of proxies the most prominent of who is Goretetse Kekgonegile who has now risen to become the Secretary General.
Lucas’ proxies are too happy to do his bidding, including pulling the BCP sideways.
But to be fair to Lucas, he is BCP through and through. And he has stayed true to the BCP founding principles.
The way it was created, the BCP would not want to be part of anything it does not control.
The party hates making compromises.
They like to control the narrative. And they relish being in charge.
To this day Lucas genuinely believes that BCP is still on course to winning state power on its own and on its own terms.
For him the damages the party experienced during the 2014 General elections were only temporary and natural setbacks to be expected in politics.
He uses his personal experiences in Bobonong as an example where he tried close to half a dozen times to become a Member of Parliament with no success until in 2019.
With growth the BCP will shortly learn that what issues they used to deal with through consensus and compromise they now cannot resolve without success.
Dithapelo Keorapetse, the BCP star MP has all but become a pariah inside the party that brought him up.
He is personally closer to Lucas than to Saleshando, but his proximity to Duma Boko makes him an outlaw among the guys that run the BCP on behalf of Lucas.
For that reason chances of his career being cut short are high.
Boko like everybody else has wasted a lot of time concentrating on Saleshando who is in office but not in power.
The sooner he accepts that power inside the BCP rests elsewhere the better for himself and his UDC future.
