Masisi must tell his party MPs to behave!

Now that his assignment as Chairperson of the SADC Organ on Defense, Politics, and Security has ended, President Dr. Mokgweetsi Masisi has a lot on his plate on the home front.

Besides the obvious Covid-19 pandemic with its socio-economic implications, Masisi must immediately restore public confidence in his government and political party.

Since his ascension after the 2019 general elections, here is a man that has faced perhaps the toughest trials and tribulations compared to all his predecessors.

Yes, Lt. Gen. Dr Ian Khama faced equally challenging and turbulent early years in his tenure, but the economic meltdown was not as devastating as the current pandemic whose effects are visible to the naked eye!

For a year now, Botswana has won the notoriety of being the only country in southern Africa that has lived under a state of emergency!

Thank God September 30th is just a month away when hopefully, the President will finally lift the SoE.

To restore public confidence in his government, Masisi will need to ensure that an independent audit is conducted on all the Covid expenditures. This is important for the sake of transparency and financial accountability.

There are allegations and fears that millions may have been siphoned through the emergency procurement to line the pockets of many that sit in the high echelons of power.

Already there is talk of ‘Covid millionaires,’ a term to denote a group of people in our community who have unjustly benefitted from the pandemic through emergency procurement.

We need reassurance that these are just mere allegations and nothing more and it’s only an independent audit that can allay these fears. So, let’s wait for the verdict.

Meantime, the President must start reminding especially private sector businesses about some of the aims and objectives for which the State of Emergency was declared.

Besides giving the President carte blanche authority to fight the pandemic, the SoE was also intended to safeguard jobs.

But we all know that many companies have already reneged on this promise by sending many of their employees packing to join the army of the jobless!

Obviously, this negates the government’s efforts to manage unemployment. It also impacts adversely on the promises carried in the ruling party’s Manifesto.

Therefore Masisi must start reiterating the objectives of the SoE to remind all employers, including the DPSM, of the need to secure jobs.

However, it would be ill-advised of the government to expect private sector businesses to carry workers when there is little to no production at all.

For this reason, private businesses have a legitimate expectation that the government will meet them halfway through some form of relief – it could be a wage subsidy or bailout for those companies facing bankruptcy or imminent shutdown.

Businesses are not charities that much we should accept and appreciate so that we can devise a collective strategy to help keep our companies afloat.

For example, the local chamber of commerce, Business Botswana (BB), could start a Covid Relief Fund into which all members contribute according to their rating – for example, small, medium, and large!

The government would also be expected to make a contribution to the Fund. Hard-pressed businesses or those facing prospects of folding could tap into the Fund to sustain their operations until this difficult phase has passed.

President Masisi must restore public confidence in his government.

The countless court cases that the Directorate of Public Prosecutions (DPP) is losing are a source of national embarrassment, especially because of the hype that attended their registration.

Sadly, this blemish is not localised but also extends to other public institutions, such as the Police, Directorate of Corruption, and Economic Crime (DCEC), the Financial Intelligence Agency, as well as the Attorney General Chambers.

For a corruption case to land in court, almost all these institutions have a role to play. It is mindboggling the rate at which the government is losing cases!

In fact, the longer this trend continues, the credence it gives to suppositions that these were merely political point-scoring gimmicks, which have sadly boomeranged.

The sad part about this is that the public is the worst loser in all this madness! It must stop. Much as we adhere to the principle of separation of powers, we believe drastic measures have to be taken to correct this anomaly.

If it requires the complete overhaul of these institutions and reengineering, for God’s sake let the appointing authority take charge, otherwise, this country risks becoming a laughing stock of the region!

Masisi must call for order in his ruling party. Debates in Parliament have descended into a sick joke. It seems Motions are not debated and voted for or against on the basis of their merits or demerits but simply along party lines.

The worst suspect in this conduct is none other than the ruling party. But let’s be clear that once a person enters those hallowed walls of the National Assembly, they are stripped of their party garments.

That is why they are known as Members of Parliament and not Members of Political Parties. It follows then, that as MPs, their duty is to make laws for the good governance of this country.

Ideally these laws should not have any semblance of partisan politics, but should carry the aspirations of Batswana. But of course, this is not happening in our current Parliament, it has turned into a

where members come to malign one another or at worst to outvote each other’s Motions regardless of the importance and usefulness of such Motions to Batswana.

Mr. President, please talk to your party to stop this.