Boko believes in coalition politics
Mompati Tlhankane | Tuesday May 23, 2023 10:54
Boko’s UDC has never held an elective congress since 2012 but he still believes that 'the people’s project' can still hold together as the storms rages on ahead of the 2024 general election.
The UDC contested the 2014 general election without the Botswana Congress Party (BCP) which had pulled out of negotiation talks. In 2018 just before the general election UDC expelled its founding member, Botswana Movement for Democracy (BMD) after accepting the BCP into the fold in 2017.
Now as the 2024 general election draws nearer, UDC has gained a troubled outfit in Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF) and about to welcome BMD splinter party Alliance for Progressives (AP) in to the coalition. Their 2019 vital partner and now disgruntled member BCP is about to walk away.
While Boko’s tumultuous journey has seen him losing even some of his trusted lieutenants, this week during a media conference he highlighted that he wished to state with almost truculent conviction that the future of opposition politics in Africa lies in coalition or aggregation.
He said the UDC represents an attempt; an enduring quest, to depart from the beaten path of separate and insular existences to carve out a unique and defiant vision of unity and diversity. “We, in the UDC, are under no illusion that coalition politics is easy or devoid of challenges. We have met and continue to face a fair number of challenges.
But the challenges have only served to fuel our belief that the allurements of our togetherness trump all the flaws and frustrations of past experiences. I know that challenges often leave our people fuming and fretting; they leave some of our leaders despondent and broken. But drawing from the heroic efforts of the UDC and other coalition experiments in Kenya, Nigeria and other places, I must urge opposition parties in Botswana and Africa, to embrace coalition politics,” Boko pointed out.
He said lack of agreement in coalitions is what strengthens unions. He also said opposition cooperation outweighs the indifferences. “The struggle to hold the coalition together is a daily struggle. It is not an easy thing and it is not anybody or everybody who can manage this thing. I am a president of the BNF and if I approached my role as president of the UDC in a partisan way where I am leaning towards the BNF I would have failed a long time ago,” he revealed. He said sometimes at the BNF there are some members who are not happy with his decisions because they feel that he compromises too much. “Coalition politics is about compromise,” he said.
Boko stated if one feels that their views are right all the time then they can’t be part of a coalition. Boko who has been accused of running a one man show at the UDC said one of the difficulties of a coalition is these attitudinal instrumentalities that people carry. He said they carry the baggage that they are better than others. “You can’t be in a coalition if you come with those trappings that some are bigger than others,” he indicated. He has since confirmed that he would not contest for a parliamentary seat in next year’s general election because he wants to give more attention to his candidates’ campaigns.