NO PEACE AT BPF
Party members smell tribalism in Butale saga
The suspension of Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF) president Biggie Butale last week has revived tensions between the pro-Butale and anti-Butale factions. Butale fell out with the party leadership earlier when the party demanded him to resign following damning sexual misconduct allegations concerning a party member. He refused to resign.
Supporters of the punitive action against the party leader have insisted that if no action is taken against Butale, the party will be deemed to be indifferent to issues of the abuse of women in general and sexual harassment in particular. If what obtains on different platforms is anything to go by, the suspension of Butale appears to have deepened the divisions within the party. The pro-Butale lobby insists that their man is being targeted because of his tribal affiliation. In fact, Butale has himself claimed that he is being targeted because he is Kalanga. “This is all make up. I for one cannot accept the allegations as true. The question is, if there was any sexual misconduct, why did the girl not report the matter to the Police?” wondered Julia Moalosi, a party activist from Palapye?
She deems the suspension of BPF president illegal, because it is not based on either social justice or any provision of the party’s constitution. Moalosi’s disappointment emanates from the likelihood that the BPF, which has enjoyed exponential growth since its inception, will lose popularity with the people due to internal instability. “Butale and Khama (Ian) started this party together. Meanwhile, those who are now hell-bent on destroying it were nowhere to be seen. Even after joining the party, they wanted someone else to be president of the BPF and not Butale. The BPF is the real hope of the opposition. Regrettably, they are tearing it apart,” Moalosi charged. Another BPF activist, Rodger Mphafe, who told this publication that the party is planning to expel him, would like the two factions to sit down and reconcile. “Anything else is counterproductive because, although some people are silent, many of them are not happy.
The expulsion of Butale would be the biggest mistake. Some of us know what we are talking about because we are talking to the party members,” said Mphafe, who is a vocal party activist from Ramotswa. Like many, Mphafe reads tribalism in Butale’s woes. Neither is he comfortable with the composition of the Disciplinary Committee. “Butale cannot be treated fairly by the Disciplinary Committee. The chairman of the committee is the former administration officer in Tshekedi Khama’s office. “One of the members of the committee is Foster Seretse, Dr Ian Khama’s cousin. Finally, of the seven members, only two are not from the Central District,” said the BPF member, who like Moalosi, wonders why the alleged Butale victim did not lodge her case with the Police.
Mphafe is also alarmed that “Butale’s haters” want him to shoulder all the bills incurred by the party during the 2019 Palapye congress. The trio of the party spokesperson, Lawrence Ookeditse, the secretary general, Tshekedi Khama and Butale, did not answer their phones despite repeated calls lasting two days.