In Botswana and South Africa, June is historically widely known to be a bloody month. For South Africa, June 16 is the period when school children took to the streets protesting against the use of Afrikaans as the medium of instruction. That country’s media never misses commemorating the day through a series of articles in the print and electronic media because protestors died at the hands of apartheid police and soldiers. That day, June 16, 1976 could be a turning point in the liberation struggle for South Africa. That is perhaps why the Organization of African Unity (OAU), now the African Union (AU) meeting in Abuja, Nigeria in May 1995 approved a recommendation to recognize June 16 as a day for the African child. That recommendation had been made by a special OAU committee chaired by Botswana’s Foreign Affairs Secretary, Geoffrey Garebamono to the organization’s council of ministers before approved by the heads of state and government. By Wednesday this week, the South African Broadcasting Corporation channel 404 was already beginning to screen pictures of June 16, 1976 as a prelude to the min day. This shows how serious they regard that day.
For Botswana, the bloody day falls on June 14. It was on that day in 1985 that apartheid South Africa raided selected places in Gaborone and Tlokweng leaving 12 dead and a trail of destruction to property. They raided Bontleng, Broadhurst and Tlokweng killing that country’s refugees in what P.W. Botha, South African President later termed the “first installment” meaning that they would continue to launch periodic attacks on Botswana. In the past, the media in Botswana used to write stories commemorating that day. Nowadays they are less enthusiastic about it. For instance at the time of writing this article on Wednesday June 14,the day’s issues of both the Botswana Daily News and Botswana Gazette newspapers were already in circulation. None of them had stories ion their pages commemorating the events of June 14. Perhaps they regard the event as insignificant.
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