BDP accused of coercing donors
Mompati Tlhankane | Monday May 22, 2023 06:00
Addressing the media on Tuesday, Boko said the businesspeople doing business in Botswana have been so intimidated, brainwashed and are fearful. He said the BDP forces their hand by putting a gun to their head, figuratively.
“They will not support anybody other than the ruling party. It is not because they like or want to but because they are forced. Some of them are blackmailed, they are bulldozed into supporting the BDP. They are phoned and told we want x millions from you.
They know what may happen so they give,” he pointed out. Boko compared the ruling party to the concept of a gunman writ large where a system of institutionalised terror forces compliance, just as a gunman forces people to hand over their money.
The former Gaborone Bonnington North legislator further claimed that the BDP intimidates all these people and blacklists those that it does not understand. “Some of our business people have BDP membership cards not because they are BDP but because they know the economic consequences of not having that card,” he said. Boko’s comments come shortly after Masisi’s nephew Pilane alleged that he was forced to donate to the BDP as his court battle with his aunt and Masisi’s sister Boitumelo Phadi-Mmutle rages on.
Phadi-Mmutle has since replied that his nephew is imagining things. “The fourth defendant never gave any unreasonable and or unlawful instructions to the Plaintiff (Pilane) as alleged or at all. What the plaintiff states is simply a figment of his imagination, to try and appear the victim, which is most unfortunate and untenable,” Phadi-Mmutle’s court papers read. Phadi-Mmutle also stated that the fact that, “The particulars of such statements are not stated, shows that the plaintiff is not being candid with the above honourable court.” Still denying that she instructed Pilane to donate to the BDP, Phadi-Mmutle said it was an afterthought meant to scandalise her. Pilane claims that soon after gaining information that a Goodhope Sub-District water supply scheme 2.2 contract for P549.6 million tender has been awarded, Phadi-Mmutle started giving unreasonable and/or unlawful instructions to him regarding the execution of the business, which he declined to implement.
“The fourth defendant informed me that for the tender to be won, such undertakings had to be made to the BDP as he has done it before by paying Pre Con some money to the BDP at tender stage,” further read papers filed by Pilane. The nephew also alleges that after refusing to give the BDP some of his tender money, his aunt threatened him. Although he could not comment on the Phadi-Mmutle and Pilane issue because the matter is currently before court, the BDP spokesperson Kagelelo Kentse told this publication in an interview this week that the BDP is not a profit making organisation and therefore survives on membership subscriptions and donations from sympathisers and well wishers. “There is no single individual or entity in Botswana that can tell you that the BDP coerced them into donating.
That’s unheard of,” he clarified. He said there is no company that was blacklisted for refusing to donate to the BDP or for its association with the opposition. “We are such a democratic state and all companies stand an equal chance to do business freely in Botswana, to do business with government regardless of their political affiliation, to benefit from government programmes such as CEDA, NDB and others. So that’s a very outrageous and irresponsible statement coming from a leader of the UDC, a man who wanted to trade out the republic in 2019 to Moti by mortgaging it.,” he further stated.