By weakening the media, the BDP risks weakening own future defence walls

When it comes to the media, the Government’s ambivalence and the ruling party’s lack of moral clarity have extended to the opposition a kind of pedestal and moral high ground that the opposition clearly has never deserved.   The general intentions of the Botswana Democratic Party towards the media have been more than aloof. Hostility and open warfare have been the modus operandi. Those intentions have embedded in them a kind of vindictiveness and humiliation in a scale that can really never be defended under a democracy. Such open hostility has had the unintended consequences of the media literally flocking towards the opposition with the hope that a better alternative to the BDP could emerge. The media / opposition marriage was never a voluntary one. While the opposition welcomed it for it served their ambitions, the media as a general rule was never really fully in it. The marriage was right from the beginning a BDP enforced arrangement, because the media, desperate for sanctuary following government attacks, had really run out of alternatives.   With all its subtleties and conveniences it was always an abusive marriage, with the media always a subservient partner.   From the onset the marriage was premised on the media submitting itself as a junior partner there to unquestionably take instructions and like automatons, never to dare ask any questions without risks of being hounded by the senior partner. Without exception, the media was forced to grovel and kowtow as way of being guaranteed continue space inside the tent. Any deviation was met with excessive force and abuse ÔÇô as the still unfolding cacophony would no doubt attest. In short, it has always been a dysfunctional marriage. Statistics show that more than fifty percent of all marriages in Botswana end up in divorce. As we now all can see, this marriage too between media and opposition, it seems is headed for divorce. To many in the opposition, media freedom, freedom of expression and such related freedoms are just empty campaign slogans wantonly thrown around solely with the intention of sounding different if not better than the BDP. Beyond that, such slogans are empty throwaways not even understood by those muttering them.   Highlighting a policy weakness on the part of opposition by the media is regarded not as part of the debate worthy of a courteous exchange, but rather as unpardonable betrayal that easily compares to blasphemy. Rather than present a counter argument, the instinct on the part of our opposition is to go for the jugular. By any account this amounts to bullying. For an opposition that sees itself as Government in waiting, more ominous is the fact that its leaders and activists seem intent on picking and choosing when such freedoms should be supported. For example when the media attacks the BDP and the BDP hits back, all of a sudden the BDP is accused of muzzling freedoms. The same is treated differently when it is the opposition, or one of their own that is misbehaving. To their utter disappointment, the media has not witnessed an upsurge in tolerance and democratization they had hoped for when they went into bed with the opposition hoping to change them from within. Quite the reverse, by the way, has been the case. Anybody who holds their own against this bullying is invariably labeled a BDP under the carpet. Facts do not mean much to the opposition leaders and their followers. Refusing to take orders from them and resisting to bend to their world view is sufficient enough a crime to be dismembered as a sellout. It is not clear if they are able to internalize it, but the cumulative effect ÔÇô other than eroding our freedoms by scaring away those who cannot stand being publicly insulted – this behavior by opposition will in the end take away from them the same tools with which they had over time used to whip the BDP ÔÇô chief of which is credibility. In the meantime the media finds itself in exactly the same spot where it all started ÔÇô in isolation and with its lights off; buffeted on one side by a ruling party led by a president whose bloodstream repels anything that the media stands. And on the other side shell-shocked by a discovery that contrary to all that they have believed, the opposition’s devotion to what the media stands for is at best opportunist and at worst outright disingenuous.   By bullying critics and insulting opponents, the opposition cannot honestly accuse the BDP of similar crimes without they being reminded of the same. In short, given what we have seen in the recent few weeks, the opposition has taken away from itself and threw through the window the much needed credibility to criticize media abuse by the BDP. No serious leader inside the new UDC has so far criticized the unmistakable intolerance that has seeped through their ranks, spewed to opponents using the social media. This silence or ambivalence can only mean consent. No wonder no serious person took them to head when they tried last year to hijack a popular campaign against child abuse in Sebina. Head for head, some of these opposition activists are worse than a BDP councilor they tried to lynch in their efforts to re-launch their fading popular appeal. To our opposition, preserving their cult-like ideals seem more important than accepting that any pretensions to power, however vague come with added responsibilities, including enhanced public probity and scrutiny. If what we hear is correct, the BDP is running its last lap. It is important for the party and indeed its Government to decide what its relations with media will be. That decision cannot be postponed until after the party is out of power. If the party leaves power under the current circumstances, then it is the current circumstances for which it will always be remembered when out of power. In other words the media shall shed no tears for the BDP. Once out of power there shall be no appetite much less nostalgia on the part of the media for a BDP comeback. In short, or put it more bluntly, the BDP in opposition is less likely to enjoy the kind of solidarity from the media that the current opposition has had and so uncharitably squandered. Under BDP’s recent rule, the country’s traditional democratic checks and balances have been significantly eroded. The media has been reduced to an inconsequential nuisance. And the courts are all but standing on one leg. This might have served a BDP that is in power. It should however be a source of worry for a future BDP that we learn is destined to lose power. By weakening the media, the BDP risks weakening own future defence walls.