In recent years Botswana has caused unprecedented military spending that has not only raised consternation among its citizens but also within the Southern African Development Community (SADC). Such “reckless” military spending falls fast on the heels of: crippling unemployment, sluggish economic growth, collapse of major parastatals and private companies, weak mining sector, dwindling foreign reserves and weakened Pula purchasing power against the basket of currencies that the Pula is pegged against. For the ordinary citizen to understand this seeming departure from rational and responsible governance two pertinent questions beg answers. Firstly, is there an eminent and present danger either internal or external that has occasioned this phenomenon? Secondly, is the Botswana government using military expenditure as an external catalyst to economic growth? If the second scenario were true, then other questions that would need to be answered as a matter of urgency for us to understand this curious state of affairs would be:
What technological, infrastructural and human capital developments does the country possess given that Botswana is merely a consumer economy? It wouldn’t be incongruous for many Batswana to hold the view that such excesses in military spending are indeed ill conceived as they crowd out investment resources thereby hindering economic growth.
How does this excesses in military expenditure assist in growing our growth domestic product? [if !supportLists]3) [endif]How does this excesses in military expenditure assist in development long term employment creation and economic diversification?
What theory is the country using to justify such expenditure? It would be inconceivable that the country would employ the supply side neo-classical model as we are a consumer economy. That is, our military expenditure isn’t based on putting aside a large share of the GDP in order to produce sophisticated military hardware or research, as in some countries, which we would later export to other countries. Nevertheless, economists have argued that it isn’t military spending though that spurs economic growth but the reverse that is true.
Is Botswana then using the demand side Keynesian theory to stimulate economic growth through heightened military spending?
Having asked these critical questions and probably finding answers to them might help citizens in understanding the current state of affairs especially on the back drop of: increased terrorism threats, espionage, capital flight, human trafficking, and cross boarder poaching. However, one needs to ask if these threats if aggregated present overwhelming evidence for increased military spending and whether military spending in Botswana is a result of economic factors or an imagined political threat? It must be understood that the security level of a nation is proportional to the ratio of a friendly nation’s asset to that of adversary nations. With this philosophy in mind, our security level is weighted against which friendly nations and which adversaries? Let’s take for example the case of South Korea and North Korea. The security level of South Korea is weighted against the security level of North Korea or North Korea’s provocation levels. What about Botswana?
As Botswana is largely a consumer economy national resources must be reallocated from the armed forces as they are a non-productive sector to productive sectors of the economy such as: mining, agriculture, manufacturing, information and telecommunication technology, research, transport infrastructure and human capital development. Such shift would ensure increase in long term economic growth and improved social security networks for improved citizen dignity of life. Botswana’s economic growth is currently being hindered by its ferocious appetite for military spending and lack of clearly defined economic diversification and growth models. In addition, economists have remonstrated that increase in security spending conversely triggers tax increases and government spending reduction in other sectors of the economy thereby, creating a drag effect in economic growth. Equally, security spending that outreaches national security needs stimulates an arms race leading to increased corruption and unhealthy national spending. An example of such corruption has been alluded to in the private media relating to Botswana Defense Force procurement and tender procedure and certain prominent families that have direct connection to the executive.
Likewise, increased and ill-defined security spending leads to decrease in human capital investment which results in increased unskilled labor precipitating poor economic development. This creates a vicious circle of poverty, unemployment, poor social security and increased dependence on government handouts. However, any rational Motswana would understand the difficulty that government faces in maintaining the delicate balance between security spending and economic growth. In view of this, an effective and clearly rationalized security budget and procurement plan is critical. Nonetheless, due to the eroded purchasing power of a large section of society, growing unemployment and general social decay government needs to be more sensitive about its security spending and be alive to widening social inequalities. *Keagakwa writes in his personal capacity as an academic
