That President Khama holds the distinguished honor of presiding over the massive implosion of the ruling party is common cause. Ironically, he was invited to politics to heal the factional divide that blighted the party. In the end, he helped in no small measure to polarize and further divide it. The birth of the BMD is a living testimony of Khama’s inability to manage dissent and accommodate alternative viewpoints. Many, including yours truly, celebrated the demise of the colossus that is the BDP. Celebration has now turned into anguish as we witness the President of the Republic polarizing a nation that has painstakingly endeavoured to preserve unity. Ample evidence abounds suggesting unbalanced distribution of development projects under the Khama presidency, an issue that has irked many in the country. Khama continues to drive a wedge between elected representatives and the electorates. At one point he caricatured them as vultures and on occasions, he has dismissed them as self-seekers who want to line their pockets by default. He is clearly saying that elected representatives cannot be trusted and he can be. By demonizing all other leaders and creating an aura of moral superiority around his persona, Khama is sowing seeds of discord in our country.
The President has over time thrown all manner of negative labels at those who disagree, oppose or hold contrary views. Unpatriotic, irresponsible and selfish are but some of the description he has awarded those who do not agree with him. Clearly, Khama is the sort of person who is critical of everybody else but uneasy with criticism leveled at his person. This is unbalanced. He is clearly at home with praise, adoration and flattery but he has not internalized the reality that life in the real world is a complex mix of positives and negatives all of which must be meticulously navigated. Khama does not celebrate diversity or cherish it. He does not seem to entertain the question as a fundamental avenue for discovery and progress. His demand for loyalty and conformity of thinking is total, something which is an antithesis to accountable governance.
The current labour relations climate has revealed the President even more clearly. He has personalized an issue of national importance and created a logjam that defies amicable resolution. The President has made statements and acted in a manner that could easily sow seeds of disharmony between different sections of a country he currently leads. Khama statements and actions continue to amplify, inflame and orchestrates antagonistic relations among the people of this country. Instead of allowing a comprehensive collective bargaining exercise to unfold, Mr Khama chose to make public pronouncements preempting the process. He announces even before the annual budget is tabled that there shall be no salary increase. This obviously was a breach of labor relations protocol and it made nonsense of the bargaining process. By the time negotiations started, positions were already hugely polarized by the President of the Republic. Workers felt undermined and DPSM felt an obligation to toe the line of a president who demands absolute conformity.
The salary negotiations started on a wrong footing and a stalemate was a natural outcome. Once the strike had started, the president, instead of allowing, the formal negotiation process to ensue, he addressed Kgotla meeting in rural villages vilifying the workers. He accused them of making unreasonable demands. He repeated the familiar rhetoric of seeking to help the poor and the unemployed. His address to the private sector devoted considerable attention to bashing the workers and opposition parties. As tensions escalate and the impact of the strike led to the closure of schools and public health challenges, the president still refuses to meet the workers. His singular mission is to paint workers as unreasonable citizens who do not care about the welfare of the disadvantaged sections of the population. His statements are calculated to alienate and isolate the workers from the unemployed, the poor and adult citizens residing in the villages. This is a divisive tactic that should not be associated with the high office of the President of the Republic of Botswana.
The President should be fully aware of the dangers of dividing the nation along economic lines. Our people are economically interdependent and the cooperation that exist between the working and non working people of this country mitigate poverty and suffering in large measure. The petty welfare programmes that the government has evolved only cater for about 20% of the poor. The rest of the poor people who number over half a million (500 000) in this country survive out of a complex production, consumption and distribution economic relations between the working and the non-working populations. Any attempt to pollute this relationship is misguided and is bound to aggravate deprivation in this country.
Khama’s Government is also peddling a divide between traditional leaders and the workers. The Government has issued a moratorium of sorts barring chiefs from receiving petitions from striking workers. The same Khama government is rolling out a crusade to attack workers at the same kgotlas that are not allowed to receive petitions from workers. The Kgotla, a traditional meeting place for all members of the community is turned into a platform to wage an assault on some sections of the population. The traditional meeting place that is the Kgotla is being used by Khama’s Government as an organ of segregation and unequal treatment of the citizens of a Republic. Sad! The workers increasingly question the integrity of the Kgotla and the traditional leaders who allow themselves to be used against them. The dramatic scenes I witnessed at the Tlokweng Kgotla the other day when Kitso Mokaila came to town represent the dwindling respect of the institution of the Kgotla occasioned by a divisive presidency. The workers came in large numbers to the Kgotla and throughout the proceedings they wondered why the Kgotla is used to mislead their parents. The unceremonious end to the proceedings and the undignified departure of a cabinet minister from the Kgotla showed very clearly that the Kgotla’s image is undergoing some battering courtesy of the tactics employed by the President who also has some chiefly (royal) credentials.
Khama is divisive. He continues to divide the ruling party. He is now dividing the nation. He is dividing the nation between those who agree with him and those who do not agree with him; between his loyalists and non-loyalists; conformists and non-conformists; patriots and non-patriots and I believe between civilians and the security sector. This polarization of a nation by a president is unhealthy and is a potent threat to democracy and sustainable development. If indeed Khama is a patriot that he purports to be, he should unify rather than divide the nation. The nation on the other hand must refuse to be divided by the President. They should strongly oppose and reject any divisive tendencies. They should hold on to the values that brought us this far as a nation. The values of mutual respect, tolerance, critical engagement and celebration of diversity must continue to guide us as we navigate through this difficult period in our country’s history. Our country is bigger than all individuals who live in it. It is certainly bigger than the president and this country will live and exist much longer than all individuals who live in it. It is for this reason that we should not allow anyone individual or group of individuals including the President to derail it from its glorious destiny.
*Lucas is BCP Information and Publicity Secretary
