Maun Councilors enraged by decision to suspend wedding ceremonies

While the tribal leadership in Maun seems resolute in its decision to suspend both customary and common law marriages effective end of September this year up to end of March 2014 when the harvesting season ends, Councilors on the other hand have sought to throw the spanner into the works by calling for a public boycott of the new idea.
They say the new policy, if implemented will affect the community negatively.
Councilors said there is an urgent need for the arrangement to be revised, more so that the District Commissioner’s office is also being implicated on the same matter. The six months waiting period has also been seen a complete waste of time as officers will now stay idle with nothing to do.
In his briefing to council, North West District Council Chairman Latlhang Molonda said in order to restore cultural and social values, the government has directed Bogosi to review their social morals and implement them effectively within their districts.
In view of this, he said the Tawana Tribal Authority has since the previous year started consultations with communities on district values, on how they are going to work once in place, as well as to have a societal view on the amendments. Molonda said besides the suspension of marriages, civil cases will also be affected, as the kgotla system will during that time only handle criminal cases.
The whole arrangement did not go on well with councilors as they believe members of the public were not given ample time to voice their concerns. They refuted claims by the tribal authority that consultations were made throughout Ngamilland, as some people claim to have only heard of the announcement during a kgotla meeting which discussed the fate of Maun Educational Park.
“We also want whoever came with the idea to be summoned here so that they may explain to this house why the action was taken. As councilors we also form part of community leaders, and so it is surprising that we were not consulted beforehand. How are we then expected to work as a team if we are left out in decision making? The suspension of services for close to half a year is quite a drawback, and we are still wondering how the authority is going to make up for lost time once they resume their duties next year. We want this issue to be discussed further because we are not going to leave things the way they are now. The authority has also sidelined us in many other issues, and now we want to put a stop at all this, because otherwise people will be forced into unfair situations for which they are not even prepared”, said the visibly enraged councilor Moedi Modiegi.