MOST PRECIOUS RESOURCE NOT PROTECTED

One sort of understands why the paramilitary Special Support Group has to be escorting cash- in- transit trucks. “Sort of ” because the Machiavellian view to take is that theft is the primary method through which money circulates. Example 1: some of the supermarkets that are getting this special service cheat customers out of their hard- earned money by selling them expired goods and rotten “fresh produce”, woefully underpay staff and evade tax. Example 2: hundreds of billions leave the Third World as illicit financial flows some of it is later “donated” back as development aid and goes not into state coffers but the personal bank accounts of political leaders. Then again we understand that the criminality of ordinary people is always an issue and so will accept that SSG has to escort cash- in- transit trucks. However, we need to rethink our national policy on the protection of valuable resources. The most valuable consignments destined for the Diamond Park or Bank of Botswana get protection that rivals that of President Joe Biden in a foreign country. In all wildlife management areas across the country, the government has deployed game scouts who have about as much firepower as the army. The moral of the story: Botswana protects its most precious resources so that they are not stolen. Oddly though, the nation’s most precious resource doesn’t get this level of protection: political power. Shouldn’t the SSG stand in between our political leaders and capitalist vultures whose desire is to steal political power?