President of the Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC), Duma Boko, has said that it would be suicidal for Batswana to grant Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) another five years to govern this country. By the time the term ends, he said, the country would be impoverished by corrupt practices the party uses to govern.
Addressing a political rally in Molepolole north marking the launch of Mohammed Khan and his team of male councilors, Saturday, Boko gave an example of how the government exercised ‘institutionalized theft’ by stealing the funds that paid Botswana Defense Force (BDF) soldiers during their peace keeping missions in Mozambique and other then war torn countries.
“When the soldiers lodged their complaints the government did not deny that it had stolen their money but said they took more than three years to lodge their complaints. They were late.”
Other soldiers have had their monthly installments stolen by their seniors.
He said when the soldiers approached him for legal intervention he could establish that indeed a saving ram was sent asking the officers to donate the money, but he asked the leadership where the response of the soldiers was.
“No one can answer to these things. We are the only ones who can do that when we ultimately take over governance. There also is a disturbing misuse of public funds where a civil servant had vast amounts deposited into his personal account. The man even gave P500 000 to his wife as gift. The wife bought a flashy car with that,” he said, adding that he has signaled to the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime (DCEC) that the official was corrupt. He has even written a 13-page letter to DCEC Director on the matter and she is yet to respond to him after months of receiving the letter.
All these developments he said, call for national unity to oust the ruling party, even by BDP members since it misuses even their properties. Boko said his umbrella of parties is ready to lead as it has a well spelled out manifesto. The manifesto is designed to improve education in Botswana. He expressed disappointment over the fact that coalition negotiations with BCP bounced due to its immaturity as it complained about representation on one constituency – Ramotswa.
Another speaker, Wynter Mmolotsi asked the rally to vote Khan to parliament as he was creative enough to use the P610 m used for Ipelegeng temporary employment to create 37000 permanent jobs. He can utilize the P583m used in Tirelo Sechaba to create 31 000 permanent jobs. “We are not going to go anywhere looking for funds. We are going to use available resources to create jobs. We are going to use accelerated land policy to slash down the long waiting period of land allocation to 36 months,” said Mmolotsi.
He asked the rally to follow in the footsteps of the neighboring Zambians who, after realizing that the Rupiah Banda government was misusing their resources on the Chinese who sponsored their ruling party decided to change government. The Michael Satah government, taking governance on solid plan transformed the economy of Zambia and the outcome of that is peaked currency.
Consequently, nurses and doctors from Zambia who worked there at Scottish Livingstone Hospital and even in Princess Marina hospital in Gaborone have returned home.
“In France the governments have changed. In England they keep changing governments. It is only in Botswana where you never change a government; that is why President Ian Khama is preparing to hand over the presidency of this country to his brother, Tshekedi. He will also hand it over to another still growing Khama,”he said.
