Dear Editor
The past two weeks I wrote a letter to Hon. Shaw Kgathi, voicing out the opinions and perception he has created for himself and his Ministry with regards to the arts.
I had a pleasure of meeting frustrated leaders of Arts Associations who have been blacklisted by the Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture for funding. The reason being that they have failed to submit financial statements in manner required by some bosses at the Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture (Funny enough these big bosses have flatly refused to meet the leaders of the arts organizations). For me this is a dangerous joke. I can’t believe more than 10 organizations can all fail to submit financial reports or receipts at one time. I just feel this is a ploy to get rid of associations and kill their bargaining power. It’s a strategy to rip certain powers from organizations and render them useless in the face of Batswana to the benefit of the same officials who benefit from meddling in artists affairs while they can’t event press “do re mi la ti do” on a keyboard.
For so long as these organizations are not well supported by the Minister there will be no arts industry in Botswana and government efforts of poverty eradication will forever be a pipedream. The most surprising thing is that Minister cares less and has not and will never make a single effort to meet them, despite having on numerous occasions arts organizations begging him for a meeting.
One may ask what is the role of the Minister? Is he not a political officer elected by the people to represent the people? What is the purpose of having a political representative who can’t make time to meet his constituents? Do artists need a Minister? These questions should be answered by arts organizations, Batswana and Hon. Shaw Kgathi not me.
There is a rumor that is going rounds that the Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture has banned funding of associations, one maybe think this is a wild rumour but in actual fact it is true because BOMU has not received its annual grant for the past 2 years. The question is where is the BOMU funding? The money has been spent on giving Amntle Montsho bonuses and throwing her parties. I have long told BOMU to foget about that Ministry but maybe focus on getting Culture Spears an award in South Africa so that the Minister can make time to throw a party for them and splash a mouthwatering bonus.
Bad planning and budgeting has become the order of the day at the Ministry. Apparently Department of Arts and Culture is broke and associations have already been told that they must foget about getting any assistance from the Department because gagona madi. One may ask how can the Department be declared destitute two months after budget presentations in Parliament? Something is amiss here.
I am also informed that Constituency Arts Competitions have been frozen indefinitely due to lack of funds. One may ask if these competitions have been frozen what structure is in place to make sure that there is no gap created? Have stakeholders been informed by the decisions to freeze the completion? We have to conclude by requesting the Minister to recommend to H.E. to shut down the Department of Arts and Culture because the Department has dismally failed to meet artists expectations.
The Minister of Youth, Sports and Culture must explain why we are aggrieved? Why the Arts are poorly budgeted? Why he does not have time to interact with leaders of Arts organizations? How he is going to fix all the chaos within the arts sector.
Yours In Music
Seabelo Modibe
