The President has criticised SADC for not pointing out and acting on the irregularities that tainted last year’s Zimbabwe harmonised polls and accused the bloc of endorsing the election even though they were not fair. These comments have elicited mixed reactions from a lot of quarters but have not surprised me. This is typical of Khama, a retired army General who has introduced a far more combative approach to issues of foreign relations.
You will recall that following the much-contested presidential elections of 2008, Botswana denounced Mugabe as an illegitimate leader – while other SADC countries failed to take the Zimbabwean leader to task. Before the SADC initiated negotiations to resolve the Zimbabwean impasse began, Botswana refused to take part in a meeting that was to include Mugabe. Although Botswana’s position was understandable when we consider the issue of illegal immigrants from Zimbabwe, it is worth noting that political solutions have never come out of exclusive dialogue. As much as Botswana can make concerns about the flaw of the electoral process in Zimbabwe, the reality of the 2008 and 2013 outcomes is that SADC works on consensus, and no country can really go it alone. I can only urge the President to reconsider the position he has taken. First, it will appear that the country is adopting double standards as it has itself ignored previous reports by SADC observer missions, now we want to pretend that we listen better than other SADC countries.
