The newsroom debate
When the Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF), an erstwhile member of the Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC) joined the coalition, we doubted the efficacy of such a move for many reasons. Mmegi Staffer RYDER GABATHUSE follows a developing
In one of my discussions with title sub editor, Stryker Motlaloso, sometimes last year, I told him my honest dreads about the BPF under its current leadership headed by Mephato Reatile, doubting that it may not survive long under the stewardship of a Duma Boko-led UDC.
This is the same political outfit (the UDC) that the opposition Botswana Congress Party (BCP) dumped after it cried foul over inner democracy and Boko’s alleged unilateralism.
First, the BPF’s membership of the UDC was reportedly hurried through and since then, the BPF leadership has apparently not been keen to openly talk about this new marriage in the public domain.
The only time the BPF-UDC relationship seemed to tick was during the Serowe-West by-election. Since the by-election, there has been total silence again, with the BPF dealing with internal issues outside the UDC. The marriage was seemingly for the convenience of winning a by-election.
As things panned out, it seems the same attitude the party leadership adopted to join the UDC was used to pull out of the coalition - secretive. As they claim, the recent decision was just a one-man show when the party has a properly structured decision-making body known as the central committee to take care of decisions of such nature.
It has always been apparent that the BPF was almost one foot out, in its UDC membership.
At one of the UDC pressers addressed by Boko at the Cresta Lodge in Gaborone last year, when BPF’s then newly crowned helmsman, Reatile was introduced, he just chose not to parrot the UDC slogan of umbrella or sekhukhu, like others were doing shouting at the top of their voices when they were introduced. Reatile chose to adopt a neutral Zion Christian Church (ZCC) greeting of Kgotsong!
To those in the dark, this was nothing, but to the converted; he was communicating a message reflecting his doubts about the new marriage. In fact, the BPF has always indicated that it was more comfortable with a pact model of cooperation than a coalition or a merger as in the case of the UDC.
But, the question is, what forced the party to sign between the dotted lines when they knew they were not ready for a relationship of that nature? Maybe, they did not know the ramifications of committing themselves, after all. They should have consulted the BCP who have real political life experience with the UDC coalition.
In my discussions with Motlaloso, I gave a political ‘prophecy’ that it was really doubtful that the relationship between the UDC and its newfound partner, the BPF, would last because the BPF is a party whose fortunes are anchored around its patron and former State president, Ian Khama.
Now, when Khama proposed that he wanted to be the face of the UDC campaigns for the 2024 General Election, all sorts of complications emerged.
This time around, Boko has chosen not to run for any constituency so that the set up can afford him the opportunity to campaign for the UDC widely until the last hour without worrying about a single constituency. This is the matter which clashed with Khama’s interests.
In one of our newsroom discussions with Motlaloso, sometime last year, we looked at a possibility that the BPF was likely to join forces with the BCP into a pact of some sort. This was also buoyed by BCP’s mantra that it was searching for ‘like-minded’ political partners that shared similar political views.
The news of the BPF change of heart from the coalition has already left the BCP shouting louder: “Re ba boleletse (We told them so)”. The BCP pulled out of the coalition claiming that the Boko-led political organisation practised totalitarianism and that inner democracy was almost non-existent. They pointed out that there was no consultation at all.
In one of the interviews with a former senior member of the BPF and now BCP operative, Dineo Tumotumo, his take was that, the only two parties that can shake the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) from the Central District and elsewhere would be a combination of the BCP and the BPF.
Tumotumo reasoned that the duo in his view, really has numbers that can beat any party, any day, a feat that the BCP and the Botswana National Front (BNF) under the UDC could not achieve at the 2019 polls.
In my engagement last year with Chakalisa Dube, Mmegi’s senior reporter based in Francistown, who is also a political reporter, we also deliberated on a likely scenario of the BCP and the BPF joining forces for the 2024 General Election.
Both the BCP and the BPF have somehow long shown their preference for a pact model especially after a failed relationship with the UDC. This is not an official BCP position but it’s based on our observations. The BCP continued to indicate that it was only looking to work with ‘like-minded’ political organisations.
Issues of mistrust and further losing identity seemingly bothered the BCP a lot to the extent that the party was left with no choice but to abandon the coalition. The BCP has apparently lost four MPs when the leadership could not convince them to enough dump the UDC.
Dube, however, could not even fathom a possibility of the BPF pulling out of the coalition as he saw the BPF as a party that needed the numbers by whatever means to oust the ruling BDP, which has been in power since independence in 1966. Going into the 13th General Election this year, the BDP still sings its mantra,
“There is still no alternative party to the ruling BDP,” given the failed opposition coalitions.
The BPF is a party that was conceptualised and came into being on the verge of the 2019 General Election amongst others by former president Khama who wanted to use the BPF as a vehicle to change government, a dream that seems far-fetched by far. The BPF formation followed an unprecedented fall out between Khama and his successor President Mokgweetsi Masisi over a plethora of issues.
The BPF hit the ground running buoyed by the ambition of taking over government. With a strong presence in GammaNgwato, the BPF emerged from the last polls with three seats based in Serowe, the capital of GammaNgwato and with many assists to other parties around the Central region. The party would have an additional MP when legislator Mephato Reatile of Jwaneng-Mabutsane crossed the floor from the BDP to join the opposition party then led by the pioneering president, Biggie Butale.
Well, Reatile has been at pains to explain the reasons why he is leading the party out of the coalition. At one stage he blames the distribution of wards and then he touches on the UDC’s tendency not to respond to queries raised by contracting partners.
There is still a lot that can be said, but perhaps, worriedly, he is not even able to articulate the position of his party. It’s fascinating how the leakages of the BPF’s impending departure from the UDC were fashioned out.
Although Khama is currently on self-imposed exile in Eswatini after a sojourn in South Africa, he does not want to trust anyone with the mammoth task of electioneering. It’s a task that he would not easily assign anyone else, but he faces a tough task running the affairs of the party remotely.
Like in 2019, Khama does not want to leave any stone unturned in his endeavour to usurp power from President Masisi, his former ally. The fall out between the two is simply a match made in hell. They don’t see eye-to-eye and so do their henchmen/women, more so that the former president is also facing charges of unlawful possession of weapons of war. The charges are unprecedented as there is no retired head of State in Botswana who has ever faced criminal charges, more so relating to weapons of war.