That presents one of the biggest problems that Botswana faces. Government has been all too keen to stifle civil society initiatives, so that it would later appropriate them for its own use.

In other words, government stole the idea of the formation of a musicians' union, creeping in the unguarded areas where the Botswana Association of Musicians could not reach, in order to establish a Botswana Musicians Union (BOMU) of its own liking.

The government pays rent for the offices of the union. It hosts meetings. And it also plays a significant financial role, which must be applauded, for the staging of the BOMU Awards.

A few days ago, the ministry staged yet another of its efforts at stealing the ideas of civil society in order to make itself look good among the cultural community of Botswana.

Many years ago, I wrote a proposal for the establishment of a Botswana Arts Trust to the Department of Culture. I was told that it was a good idea. It remained only that, a good idea. Ga bo gore tududu.

Ten years later, the Ministry of Culture holds a workshop to discuss, as a tentative idea, the very idea that I had put to them when I proposed the establishment of a National Arts Trust.

It has now become a baby of some government ministry. 

That is not just theft of ideas. It is also an attempt to corrupt the noble ideas of innocent artists who want progress, so that things will appear as if they were the works of government.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with government taking an interest in the arts. In fact it must be applauded. But government's role must remain that of 'taking an interest'.

Never should the government be seen to be stealing the ideas of practitioners in order to use them for justification of the existence of the new ministry, or proof of efficacy of the knowlegeability of the ministry in matters of the arts.

In desperation, I did point out at the recent beer party at the Botswana National Productivity Centre (BNPC) that the notion of an arts council had long been discussed and accepted by a presidium of the Botswana National Cultural Council, which tasked its Arts and Creativity Committee to provide guidelines.  Phillip Segola took responsibility for that task. David Slater had a long history with the BNCC and Maru a Pula was a great beneficiary of its funds.

There have always been good people at the Department of Culture until it was treated as an experimental ground for fresh graduates and people who drove past the Botswana Police College and the Botswana Defence Force (BDF) recruitment offices.

The artists of this county want consideration of the establishment of a national arts council that will not be a child of the ministry in the same way as the Botswana Musicians Union was crafted.

It becomes very dangerous for a democracy, that government should want to appropriate the thoughts and initiatives of practitioners for political purposes.

The Botswana Arts Council should be, and remain, an enterprise of the artists. The artists will find a role for the government and for other sectors of participants in the economy who stand to benefit from the arts sector.

Having so said, it must be acknowledged that Botswana has no musicians' union, and no other legitimate representative of arts practitioners. Artists are therefore duty bound, in spite of the manipulations at the Ministry of Culture, but rather with its support, to mobilise artists for the establishment of a federation of the arts who should play a decisive role in the functioning of the Botswana Arts Council in concert with government and civil society.

As the discussion unfolds, the artists must be vigilant and wary of the programme of government to usurp the initiatives of enterprising citizens and to make them appear as if they were the property of the state.

When that happens, the citizen efforts lose their spontaneity, and begin to appear as political party programmes suited only for the benefit of making the rulers of the day to look better than their competitors.