Steve Bantu Biko, that anti-apartheid activist, once said he wrote what he liked.
I, on the other hand, do like what I write. Steve Biko fought and wrote against racial segregation in South Africa.
Luckily for me and my country, racial segregation has never been a big issue here. We read in history books that some people were against the late Sir Seretse Khama’s marriage to Ruth Williams just because she was of the white race.
The black Sir Seretse Khama, however, stood by his convictions and went against the wishes of those people, some of whom we learn were his uncles, and married the white Ruth. So, while racial segregation was a hot potato in South Africa, racial integration was celebrated in Botswana, thanks, largely, to Sir Seretse Khama’s stubbornness to marry Ruth Williams.
People of all races continue to live in harmony in Botswana.
Like I already mentioned, Biko wrote against apartheid in South Africa while I, on the other hand, write against the erosion of civil liberties in Botswana. I write against the intolerance and arrogance that is sometimes displayed by our leadership.
But before I move on to explain why I like what I write, let me declare, here and now, my undying love for my president, the revered Lieutenant General Seretse Khama Ian Khama.
Why do I want people to know that I love my president? Well, I don’t see why I should hate my president. It has since been brought to my attention that some people think I hate my president. Some people, perhaps even the president himself, thinks I’m his number one enemy.
Some morons even choose to hate me not because they are sure my president doesn’t like what I write about him but simply because of their entrenched sycophancy; they suspect that the president could be upset with me. I have never really understood why people harbour such hallucinatory thoughts that I hate my president.
I would never hate my president because I will never benefit anything from the hate. I like my president just the way I like any other guy who has never, say, snatched my cellphone or snatched my girlfriend. What I’m trying to drive home here is, I like all people who have never done anything to hurt me personally and my president makes it into that list.
I don’t know the president personally and as such I can never hate him personally. When I wrote last week that I hate Khama’s dislike for alcohol I didn’t mean I hate the man and even kindergarten kids who are still grappling with English can give the exegesis of my last week article.
I love my president as a person and only hate the way he sometimes fails to protect or observe my rights as a citizen.
I hate, not the president but the way he sometimes treats the entire nation like a father or head teacher would a bunch of directionless children.
I hate, not the president but the way he sometimes applies selective discipline to the people he leads.
I hate, not the president but the way he wants to impose his personal life style on everyone. I have a problem, not with Khama the person but Khama the president whom I feel, blindly believes the Biblical “thou Kingdom come” was realized with his coming in to the presidency.
I have a problem with people who derive joy in misleading my president into believing he is a replica or a clone of Jesus Christ whom the preachers say was a Messiah who had remedies to all problems besieging nations. It is a pathetic fallacy to assert that the president is infallible.
For as long as the president cannot, unlike Jesus Christ, walk floatingly on water, or turn water into wine, or feed thousands of people five loaves and two fish, he remains human just like you and me and, as such, is bound to err.
The president may be immune to litigation but definitely not immune to error of judgment at some point.
To show the president our love, we do not necessarily have to nod in agreement to all his actions. We should love and follow our president but what we need to avoid is to be blinded by our love for our president. He is the driver, we are the passengers and cabinet ministers are supposed to be his navigators. Until and unless President Khama’s ministers, who are supposed to be his navigators, realize the importance of their role in his leadership, the president will drive all of us with him into the trench. Running the country can never be a one man show.
Running a country is more complex than running a family or the army. You can groom your children to grow and be like you but you can never lead and expect the entire nation to be like you. You can instill discipline and restrictions on the army but it will be unfair to apply the same discipline and restrictions on civilians.
I have said it before, those soldiers chose and applied to be in the barracks and live by the rules and regulations of the barracks whereas we, the civilians, didn’t choose to be citizens of this country. The president should avoid situations where citizens of this country would wish they were never born here.
I shouldn’t envy the Americans for the freedom they enjoy just because my president starves me of the same indulgence. As far as I’m concerned there’s no love lost between me and my president. In fact I sometimes feel I love my president more than a lot of people who never question any of his actions or lack thereof.
Were I to be president and people who work with me agree to everything that I do or want done, I would be worried for it is impossible to be always right on everything. I do not know whether my president denies people the opportunity to think independently or it is people themselves who believe they can never think any better than the president. In my social interactions with one of the best motivational speakers, Lets Sithole, he once said, “it is the most dehumanizing thing you can do to a people if you deny them the opportunity to think and act on their thoughts for the betterment of their lives as they see fit”.
Sithole wondered why is it that we have a few people who perceive themselves to be the anointed thinkers for the masses. We are the only creatures that are known to think for ourselves and have the power to fashion our lives as informed by our thoughts. Sithole rhetorically asked, “if a society appoints a group of thinkers, whether officially or not, does it not turn the rest of the populace into parasites for they are denied the opportunity to think for themselves and thinking is the only thing that we are supposed to do for surviving?
If you cannot think and are therefore required to act upon choices that have been put before you by the “architects of choice”, instead of employing your independent faculties of mind, doesn’t that make you more of an animal than human?
I like what I write for it allows me to express my independent thoughts. I like what I write because, in critiquing the president, I’m only trying to make him a stronger person. I want the president to appreciate his flaws. I like what I write because it helps get our leaders out of their comfort zones and realize that they are not our masters but our servants. I like what I write because I want to show people that being president is not a God sent vocation and being president doesn’t mean you have the monopoly to all the good ideas.
Hating me or trying to silence me wont in anyway distract me from liking what I write.
I thank God because I’m always ahead of all the plans that are being hatched to silence me. I know my safety is not guaranteed when I drive around. I know my safety is not guaranteed in my house. I know my safety is not guaranteed at bars and clubs. I know my job security is not guaranteed.
What I do, however guarantee is that I like my president and I like what I write.
