Although a founder member of the ruling Botswana Democratic Party whose circle of friends included a number of political big shots, McDonald Seema, who recently died at the age of 78, looked down at politics and despised politicians.
He never regarded himself as one of them. To him, they were a different tribe. They could not be trusted. Because they kept on changing and shifting their positions, he found it a big mistake to entrust politicians with power.
His icon was always the civil service. For the years that I knew him, Seema never stopped talking about the civil service which he joined as a young clerk in the 1950s and only left when he retired in the 1980s.
During the many hours of conversations that we had he never stopped extolling the virtues, the power and prestige of being a civil servant. When I first met him, he was surprised to learn that I had never wanted to be a civil servant.
It was clear from him that I had no idea what I was missing.
He struck me as a simple, honest and independent-minded man. More importantly, he came across as a principled, erudite man who was content with himself.
Education meant a lot to him, and one of the first questions he put to me from early on was what I had studied at the university.
Even as he was let down by increasing corruption, dishonesty, laziness and a growing culture of entitlement in today’s civil service, he never lost faith that the institution remained the best place from where one could serve and effect change.
From beginning to the end, he believed that ministers should never have the power to hire or sack civil servants. His belief in the permanence and political detachment of the civil service was absolute.
A little over ten years ago while working for Botswana Gazette, I had the first and only formal interview with McDonald Seema.
The interview was arranged by his son, David. It was then that it immediately became clear what a great memory the man had. His independence of thought was unmistakable.
Things were not going right in the civil service and something had to be done, he said.
During the interview, Seema banged the tables when talking about what he saw as the unwillingness to learn by today’s civil servants. He was particularly unhappy that politicians of today were all too eager to meddle in the sphere best reserved for civil servants.
Seema talked about a culture of putting money and promotion ahead of the service, and it saddened him.
It pained him that not even senior civil servants appreciated their mandate, not to mention the high expectations the public had in them.
In glowing terms, he talked of Sir Seretse Khama, the first President of Botswana who he admired for never wanting to interfere in the day to day operations of the civil service.
His dedication to the civil service as an institution is perhaps best captured by the fact that he joined at the very bottom and only retired after becoming a top member of the parish.
At his retirement he was Deputy Director of Personnel, the forerunner of today’s DPSM, which I also learnt from him was responsible not just for hiring and firing civil servants but also enforcing his beloved General Orders, the small booklet which he had internalized as to literally know by heart.
He talked of a long line of the many ideal civil servants that Botswana has had over the years and the mere mention of their names filled him with pride.
As always, he was at his happiest when talking about the time he had spent with them in the service, Peter Fawcus, T.J. Molefhe, Quill Hermans, Gobe Matenge, Titus Madisa, J.D Tebape, Festus Mogae, Lebang Mpotokwane, Mike Molefhane, David Finlay, Lawrence Lekalake, David Rendoh, O.k. Nelson, to name just a few.
On at least two occasions, McDonald Seema told me that Titus Madisa was one of the finest if not the most brilliant person he ever had to work with.
“I was the one who employed Festus Mogae when he came back from school in 1968,” Seema would boast with undisguised contentment ÔÇô and Mogae was a serving Head of State at the time.
It was Peter Fawcus who instilled in Seema a culture of independence, fairness and an upright moral rectitude.
“Peter Fawcus once told me never to try to please everyone. He taught me to take the right decision and learn to live with it,” Seema once said.
For all his attributes, Seema’s sharp and very clear memory was his strongest.
A few years ago, when a journalist colleague from the South African Sunday Times approached me to help him chase a story that involved the events surrounding then SA Minister of Health’s stay in Botswana in the 1970s, I took him to Seema for his research.
My colleague was astounded by the amount of detail and clarity that the “old man” had to offer.
“Can I trust that what that old man is saying is true?” he asked me after interviewing Seema. I told him not to worry.
Seema had just told the South African journalist why the then SA Minister of Health, Manto Msimang-Tshabalala, had been sacked from Lobatse Athlone Hospital where she had worked as a doctor in 1975. To my journalist colleague that was simply unbelievable.
Seema was part of a team that had sacked the former doctor turned minister of health. The story was to make waves in South Africa and it was not long before South African journalists turned Seema’s house into a pilgrimage for further investigations.
Although I have always known Seema to be a very close personal friend of Patrick Balopi, the former minister and speaker of the national assembly was never exempted from the rigours and passions of Seema’s tongue.
It was not unusual to arrive at the counter of the parliament bar to find the two men locked in a heated argument on a point of historical detail. Seema would not withdraw from the debate until such time that he felt he had defeated his younger friend on the matter.
Many years after he had left the service he still made it a point to regularly update himself on changes taking place within the civil service.
A regular figure at the parliamentary bar where he enjoyed his gin and tonic with lemonade, Seema’s favourite topics were history and the evolution of the civil service.
With his memory stretching well into the pre-independence era, he knew by heart the names and dates of people and events that had shaped Botswana. For a history student like me, he was a marvel to listen to.
Seema’s death has robbed Botswana of a walking reservoir of knowledge that I can say, with absolute certainty, is irrecoverable. Many a time I had agreed with him that we would sit down to take notes for what would ultimately result in a book of some sort cataloguing major events he had observed in Botswana’s recent history.
I am ashamed to confess that I never honoured that agreement even as he was until the end of his life always too keen to allow me his time. For a man who was in such first name term basis with almost all of Botswana’s earliest administrators it is a shame of national proportions that we have allowed him to leave this world without recording anything substantive from him.
Only recently when doing research for my weekly column I called him on his mobile in the evening to verify if Botswana’s first general elections had been held in 1965 and not 1966.
He not only told me the day, month and year, he went on at length to describe to me the mood at the time, the dynamics, the expectations, the main players, and, of course, the outcome.
Although he was a staunch BDP supporter I sensed from him that even as he remained unquestionably loyal, towards the end he felt let down if not disillusioned by the direction his party was taking.
Although he still talked with fond memories how at Kanye Sir Ketumile Masire supervised him when he volunteered to type the party’s first manifesto ahead of the first elections, there was an underlying concern that today’s BDP was not the party that he had always known.
I can say with a clear conscience that he was never a keen supporter of Ian Khama as President.
As Festus Mogaes days as President drew to an end, Seema worried a lot about Botswana’s future.
In his typical broad laughter he would end up the topic by underlining that at least at his age he did not have to worry too much about having to live too long under the new government.
“It’s you guys who are remaining behind. I am happy that I will not be a part of it,” he said to me more than once.
And with hindsight, he was right. He did not have too long a time in his life to put up with the current government.
But as always the subject would inevitably, or should I say invariably switch away from politics and veer into the civil service.
Robala Ka kagiso, Mmolaatou
