President Mokgweetsi Masisi has been labelled as someone who promises so big yet he delivers so little or none at all. This because when he campaigned to occupy the highest office in the land in the 2019 general election, he overpromised Batswana heaven and earth. Typical of such promises was the recent promise in his State of the Nation (SONA) with regards to the release of the report on the Constitutional Review which was handed to him by the chairman of the Commission of the Constitutional Review former Chief Justice Maruping Dibotelo at the end of September 2022. At paragraph 27 of the SONA, he said that ‘The Report of the Presidential Commission of Inquiry into the Review of the Constitution of Botswana will be made publicly immediately’. Other promises that were made in 2018 was the resuscitation of the Public Service Bargaining Council (PSBC) and the electric car. None of these issues have been delivered let alone an update made in this year’s SONA. It is fair to conclude the PSBC and the electric car issues were purely political rhetoric to woo public servants and other votes to vote for the Botswana Democratic Party in the 2019 general election.
Oxford dictionary defines the word immediately as ‘at once; instantly’ or ‘without any intervening time or space’. On the basis of these definitions which I believe no one has qualms with, my expectation was that as soon as the President concluded his address, those responsible for publicly releasing the report would have immediately punched the release button in order to bring his promise to life. Not so in the era where the nation is always taken for granted by the sloppy nature of how the Office of the President treats very important national matters. One of such notable matter is when the office kept mum about the President’s whereabouts when he was not seen in public only to be told at the eleventh hour that he was in fact on leave and enjoying it in the United States. As at yesterday, the promise to deliver the Constitutional Review report ‘immediately’ would have been a week older than should be the case. For all intents and purposes, the delay in releasing the report immediately as suggested speaks to one or two issues. Firstly could be that those who are supposed to release the report were not given the green light to do so or secondly, the President was informed the report was ready to be immediately released as suggested when in actual fact that was not the case. Given the sloppy conduct of The Office of the President as already alluded to, it should not be far off to conclude the sloppiness is yet to abate. In fact, the office has become synonymous with sloppiness.
Whatever the case and assuming without conceding it is easy to suggest the report is not yet ready to be released immediately, one would have expected as a bare minimum, his office to be decent enough to inform the nation why the report is still pending seven days after the President announced it will be so immediately released. Or should the nation conclude it is ‘system down’ as it has become the norm than an exception at the Government Enclave? Your guess is as good as mine!
By virtue of the fact that reviewing or amending the Constitution is one if not the most important public duty of Batswana from all persuasions, it was expected this duty would be exercised with all possible care and integrity given its material benefit to Botswana’s democratic dispensation in more ways than one. The process of reviewing or amending the Constitution through a Presidential Commission of Inquiry legislation was and is still heavily criticised by the academia from all persuasions together with the wider civil society organisations. The criticism in the main is that a Presidential Commission of Inquiry by its very nature is a process whose outcomes to Batswana are solely determined and sanctioned by the President. In the end, it is the President who solely determines whether or not to accept and enforce the recommendations in the report. There have been reports to the effect that the President himself and the Minister for State President have out-rightly rejected the wish or desire of many Batswana with respect to the direct election of the President. It goes without saying the President and his executive will push very hard that direct election of the President is shot down. They will simply direct their lap dog being the back bench in parliament to reject it.
With the forgoing in mind and particularly that the Constitutional Review Commission was and is still mired in controversy of epic proportions as already alluded to, one would have expected sobriety and a sense of urgency to release the report as immediately as the President suggested. More controversy looks set to follow the report every step of the way in that justifiable questions will be asked as to whether the report and whenever it will be released, will be in the original form as when presented by Justice Maruping. Batswana will not be able to tell whether or not the released version will be the true version from the Commission given the fact that only the President has the overall control over it in terms of what Batswana are allowed to know or not. Without any fear of contradiction, the Constitutional Review process is essentially the President’s and from the way it commenced, it will be his way or the highway. In other words, it will serve more of his interests than Batswana’s. Batswana were only used to legitimise the process.
In the final analysis, I argue very strongly that the Office of the President has not treated the Constitutional Review process with the respect it deserves. It has not come as a surprise to me that seven days after the President promised Batswana during his SONA that the said report would be released for public consumption immediately after his address. In the absence of any information as to why it has not been realised, it breeds a lot of conspiracy theories like whether the President has not reneged on reeasing the report as promised. The other conspiracy theory could be that the report is still being doctored for this or the other reason(s). Whatever the case, the legitimacy or credibility of the report will be uppermost in the minds of some Batswana particularly those who had strong misgivings about the process from the outset. This without doubt leaves the President in a more precarious situation wherein some will further develop their strong belief that he is a dishonest person who does not walk the talk. The controversy surrounding the Constitutional Review process has exceeded expectations and cannot therefore be allowed to deepen any further. I am prepared to be persuaded otherwise as always. Judge for Yourself!
