Every year on the third Monday of July Botswana celebrates what is called Presidents Day Holiday. In 2014 the holiday is scheduled for 21st July and as excitement build up and businesses capitalizes on the opportunity provided by the holiday, I find myself a bit befuddled and offended.
To many of us the observance of Presidents day has always gone very much unnoticed largely because we are content that it is just another opportunity to stay away from work and indulge. However, President Khama’s style of leadership has caused me to critically examine the purpose of this holiday. Yet the more I scrutinized its significance, the more it is confusing and irritating. It is not clear whether the holiday is meant to celebrate past presidents or the current one. Relatedly, it remains unclear whether it should be Presidents day or President’s day holiday.
Of course most of us have never really bothered to enquire about the meaning of the holiday to the ordinary citizen save that many workers get the day off from work. Assuming that the holiday was intended to honour past presidents, it is expected that the day should have special activities tailored to truly make citizens pause to remember and pay tribute to past presidents who devoted much of their adults lives in service to the nation with no expectation of huge rewards. In this respect, one may argue that the holiday is justified to the extent that it recognized the selflessness and sacrifice made by our past presidents in crafting a society that has been the envy of even the hard to please Europeans.
From this perspective, it could be posited that the over-arching objective of the holiday would have been to celebrate the past presidents’ leadership in the founding of this once great republic and to inspire individuals and organizations to take action to help safeguard and consolidate our democracy and economic prosperity as well as challenge every one of us to help change lives for the better. If that was its rationale, it would seem that it has been hijacked by the Khama’s administration and have become another stage-managed fame building show meant to present President Khama to his ever hungry-eyed supporters. As a result, the day’s activities are styled to specifically recognize the philanthropist capabilities of President Khama especially after he directed that the holiday should be modified such that much of the day is set aside for the National Heritage awards presented by President Ian Khama himself and this is the cause of much irritation.
My opinion on President Khama’s leadership has always been consistent that President Khama has taken Botswana on the wrong path. Botswana has lost traction in entirely every important area and his failure to rein in his corrupt friends means that President Khama is a champion of corruption and nepotism. Newspaper reports indicate that under Presidnt Khama corruption has reached tipping point. In this regard, celebrating the President Day holidays whether in honour of President Khama or the presidency office is akin to celebrating corruption, failure of leadership and naked abuse of office. Honouring a corrupt and failed president would thus be stupid and scandalous.
Looked from this angle, the President Day holiday is insulting and a provocation of the highest level. It is certainly a reminder of our deprivation, degeneration and disintegration. In no small measure, the holiday reminds us of the cruel person we have as our state president ÔÇô inward looking, self-seeking corrupt magician protected from public condemnation. Instead of honouring a cruel, corrupt and clueless state president who has ruined our erstwhile resilient republic, genuinely patriotic citizens need to introspect much deeper and consider making a contribution, small or big, to restore the image and prestige of this nation. They must ask themselves honest questions specifically the meaning and purpose of the President Day holiday other than merely offering us an extra day to imbibe and/or copulate for extended hours.
How do we manage to have fun-filled President Day holiday when we are hungry, abused and homeless? So let us not grace the day’s events so that we give them and their friends, space to celebrate their riches without worrying about our hungry and miserable looks. As patriotic citizens, we must do what give full expression to the values we have always stood for ÔÇô values of social justice and the ideals of a truly democratic society. We must stand up to be counted among selfless citizens who fought for their freedoms and this would be more rewarding than being counted as recipients of soup. Ultimately, instead of celebrating and honouring an incorrigible dictator, we need to dedicate the day to doing something to stop President Khama from delivering us to hell by managing our republic as if it were his pig farm. Howard Zinn remarks that dissent is the highest form of patriotism.
Those whose conscience would not allow them to antagonize President Khama by engaging in open defiance should rather boycott the day’s activities and stay home with their children rather than grace the day’s events and give support to the overzealous despot. We should refuse to allow our children to be used as rented audience to give the occasion a higher approval rating. Feasting, dancing and ululating distract from the real issues facing this country and make us play into the evil hands of the dictator. Going forward, we need to subject this comic holiday to serious public debate with a view to redefining it and free it from a centrally dominating self-centred zealot or better still censor it and relieve the economy of this unnecessary burden.
