Mmegi is reliably informed that councillors for the two parties met on Wednesday in Mochudi and settled on BNF’s Jerry Rasetshwane to vie for the position of council chairperson with the BCP’s Stephen Makhura as his deputy. The elections are scheduled for today. Rasetshwane was the BNF’s parliamentary candidate for Kgatleng West and lost to the incumbent, Rakwadi Modipane of the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP). Makhura lost the race for the Kgatleng East parliamentary seat to Isaac Mabiletsa of the BNF.
A combined vote of the BNF and BCP is likely to oust the BDP from the leadership of the Kgatleng District Council. The opposition has 14 councillors - nine from BNF and six from BCP - while the BDP has 12. It is said that the opposition has preferred to tap the knowledge of the nominated councillors - Rasetshwane and Makhura - to head the council. Although the two opposition parties have finally settled on the candidates, Mmegi is reliably informed that there was a deadlock with the BCP arguing that Rasetshwane was not politically mature to head the council. They wanted their man Makhura to be chairman.
When contacted yesterday, Makhura confirmed that the two parties have agreed on a joint approach to the elections. “Yes we agreed. At the end of the day, we are fighting for a single course. It looks like we are going to vote together,” Makhura declared.
Meanwhile, the BDP councillors in Kgatleng have cried foul that nominations for the council have disadvantaged them as it has given the opposition an upper hand.
“In all the constituencies, where the ruling party is in majority, nominated councillors are for the ruling party. It is only in our area where opposition councillors have been nominated,” Bogare ward councillor in Mochudi, Gilbert Mangole said yesterday.
“We have been of the belief that the nominations are done to express the wishes of the people and nothing else. In our case, it is clear that this was meant to empower opposition at our expense,” he said.
He argued that the Local Government Minister, Margaret Nasha, is to blame for the state of affairs.
