We are faced with a national crisis. The country is plunged in darkness and thirst. There is no electricity in the country. There is no water, at least in Gaborone, the capital city of the country and the arrival point of foreign investors. However, and in the midst of all these, the first citizen has elected to play indifferent. In fact, it would seem our cave-crazed president has gone into hiding, probably somewhere deep in the Gchwihaba caves.
He may as well be holed up at his private island in Samochima near Shakawe where he enjoys uninterrupted supply of clean water and an abundant supply of electricity through backup power generators procured through government purchase orders. Still, our ever playful president could be busy playing with quad bikes at his Nkandla replica in Mosu, with his dominantly male accomplices. The president just can’t be bothered over the inconveniences brought about by power outages on the nation and the business community. The country’s economy is at stake because of power outages but our president has decided to abandon the capital city and instead chooses to shoot the breeze with elderly folk in rural villages where electricity is not an everyday necessity. Our president makes time to sit around bonfires with villagers while the economic cogwheel of the country has been halted by prolonged power outages. It’s really sad. It’s so painful. In fact, it’s so scary.
Look, I have exhausted all my anger on these unprecedented power cuts and water rationings currently besieging our country. I have moved from just being angry to now being more scared. Yes, I am angry because these power outages are not due to any form of natural disaster that is beyond human control. All this mess is man-made, so to speak. I am angry because these power outages are man-made but no man is willing to come forth and take responsibility. I am angry that while these power outages pose a serious threat to national and more significantly economic security, the head of the nation, being the State president, has decided to disappear from the public radar. Of recent, the president has even stopped appearing on national television where it had now become the norm for him to headline every news bulletin, broadcasting even some of his aimless and purposeless walkabouts in the dusty streets of low income residences. There are times when I feel Khama is God’s curse on this nation. If we are to believe Khama is God-sent, then it would seem he was sent as God’s way of punishing us, for whatever sins we may have committed against the Almighty. I have never seen, heard or even read about any leader with an ‘I don’t care’ attitude such as Khama. I have never come across a leader who seems to derive pleasure from the discomfort of his people like it appears with Khama.
How are we not to view Khama as a curse when the country has been rapidly going down the drain ever since he usurped power? We should be worried that we have a leader who never shows up whenever the country is faced with problems. We should be worried that in Khama we have a leader who believes his only duty is to address the nation only when there is good news to deliver. A leader who never owns up to his mistakes and apologize to the people he leads is not a good leader. A leader who is never around to empathize and comfort his people during trying times is a bad leader. Khama has really bad public relations acumen. It would seem Khama was raised to believe he is infallible and not prone to err like all human beings. I mean, how else do we explain his fear to acknowledge and accept failures in his leadership?
You see, there is something that Khama doesn’t grasp with Batswana. We are a very tolerant nation that accepts bull dung and instead of utilizing our tolerance and docility, Khama is now abusing us. I can assure you that many Batswana are not necessarily incensed by the power outages but are rather angry at the silence that comes from the leadership of the country in as far as this issue is concerned. Fellow columnist Lediretse Molake questions Khama’s so-called bravery and opines that only a brave president can stand in front of public servants and say “we have had our differences, sometimes fundamental, but we have a shared responsibility to serve Botswana. In order to succeed in this development process we need to find a solution to our differences. We can only do this if we invest energy in understanding each other. Let us sit down and find each other”.
I couldn’t have put it any better. You read opinions of people such as Molake and you wonder and just wish they were the kind of people the present would surround himself with. During the 2011 public sector strike, I opined that it was very easy for the president to avert the strike had he chosen humility over arrogance in dealing with the public servants. Had the president sat down with the Union leaders and talked like a responsible statesman, the workers would not have gone on strike. The workers went on strike on the basis of the language that Khama and his then vice president used on the workers. Khama labeled them unpatriotic, for seeking what was duly and reasonably due to them. His deputy, Merafhe, said public servants do not deserve salary increment because they drive expensive cars as he had seen them parked by their gathering place of strike. A responsible leader would have firstly acknowledged and accepted that indeed salary increment was due and thereafter obediently asked the workers to bear with the country’s economic situation.
To the workers, a message that came from the leadership was that there is money but there is no need for salary increase. The same applies to the current situation. Batswana would be only disappointed but not angry were the president to come out and accept the failure by government to provide electricity while assuring the nation that his leadership is concerned and doing something about it. Khama has failed this nation and if indeed he has been sent to us by God, it is about time we prayed to the same God to intervene.
