We applaud Zenene Sinombe’s appointment to Western Sahara
It is a great joy to learn that your country is represented in the international community. The war between Russia and Ukraine has actually brought this realisation into sharp relief, following the successful evacuation of seven of the nine Batswana students that were in Ukraine.
Sadly, two of them were said to have opted to remain behind to check developments before deciding whether to leave or not. I heard our Foreign Minister, Dr Lemogang Kwape say they acceded to their demands since it is their democratic right to freely choose.
I beg to differ. Those peoples need to be counselled. We don’t want to cry over spilled milk. War is real. There is no playing hide and seek when bombs and shelling is the order of the day!
We also heard that there are over 100 students in Russia and that arrangements were being made in collaboration with their families to ensure their utmost safety.
This brings me to the point that Botswana really needs to establish an Embassy in Moscow. Coordinating travel arrangements and evacuation for those Batswana in Russia will definitely prove a cumbersome exercise given that our embassy is in Stockholm, Sweden.
I plead with the president, Dr. Mokgweetsi Masisi to do the needful and establish an embassy in Moscow. Russia is a strategic partner. I know that we voted with the majority at the United Nations concerning the sanctions against Russia, but I believe that Russia has been provoked beyond limits by the United States and its Norh Atlantic Alliance partners, using Ukraine as a proxy.
And while there, let me heartily commend our government for having taken the right step by appointing Mr. Zenene Sinombe as Botswana’s firstever Ambassador to Western Sahara, a country in North Africa that holds the unenviable tag of Africa’s last colony.
It is a shame that Africa still has to grapple with home-grown imperialists who think it does not matter to subjugate an independent and sovereign state.
What Morocco has done to Western
Sahara cannot be condoned by any selfrespecting African, worse still it denigrates the values that the African Union upholds and cherishes, the same values for which that pan African organisation was created.
But the fact that the African Union saw it fit and proper to grant Morocco full membership tells me that the AU must have abandoned those values, the values that inspired the decolonisation of the mother continent!
Worse still, the fact that Morocco is a neighbour and fellow African state, makes her occupation of parts of Western Sahara all the more repulsive! And to add salt to injury, Morocco is engaged in a full war with Western Sahara, with Polisario Front defending the sovereignty of the Sahrawis!
This is the den unto which His Excellency Sinombe has been thrust, but he should not falter in his assignment. Botswana has trusted him to represent us and the values of independence, freedom and justice. Therefore he should go out and project them to all and sundry.
The people of Western Sahara are true Africans. Their President Brahim Ghali, who received Ambassador Sinombe’s credentials on Tuesday March 1, 2022, is an embodiment of these values.
I have equally seen these attributes in their Ambassador to Botswana H.E Malainin Mohamed since he presented his Credentials to President Masisi on the 12th of August 2019, as the first Saharawi Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador to Botswana.
H.E Mohamed is a man of calm
demeanour but a Pan African revolutionary to the core. He has told me on countless occasions how he is humbled by the firm and principled position that Botswana has always adopted towards the legitimate struggle of the Saharawi people for independence.
Botswana, he has told me, has voiced this honourable position in various regional and international forums, mainly at the level of the African Union and the United Nations.
Just recently, he told me after witnessing Ambassador Sinombe present his credentials in Chahid Al Hafed in the SADR, that the appointment was history in the making.
“His Excellency President Masisi
is making history in the relations between our nations by appointing an Ambassador to Saharawi Republic.
“He is giving a strong proof of Botswana’s and his personal commitment to the rule of law, international legality and Pan African solidarity”.
The Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic is presently engaged in a bitter struggle with the Kingdom of Morocco for freedom and selfdetermination, which has occupied parts of its territory,
The United Nations Secretary General has since appointed a Mediator to revive the stalled process of a plebiscite that should eventually allow the Western Sahara to choose their destiny.