Relieved Boko faces headachy campaign
Mompati Tlhankane | Monday May 29, 2023 06:00
With the Presidential Commission of Inquiry into the Review of the Constitution of Botswana rejecting Batswana’s plea to have a direct election of the president, it is now clear that Boko will not get to have that bout with the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) president Mokgweetsi Masisi or any other contesting president. The current system is that a person becomes president if supported by the majority of the elected members of the National Assembly. Instead, each of Boko’s contesting candidates would determine whether or not he enters the State House after the 2024 General Election. Boko has already made it clear that incumbent UDC Members of Parliament (MP) and councillors who express interest would automatically become the party’s candidates for the 2024 General Election.
“The deadline for sitting representatives who were elected in 2019 under the UDC and would like to remain and contest the 2024 General Election under the UDC has been set for May 31, 2023. All those desirous of availing themselves of this opportunity must formally communicate with the UDC,” Boko announced recently during a press conference.
Despite all his political baggage after losing the Gaborone Bonnington North constituency to the BDP’s Annah Mokgethi in 2019, Boko said he has sacrificed his area to concentrate on mounting strong political campaigns ahead of next year’s polls. It will be his third straight attempt at unseating the BDP as the UDC president in a general election, so there are some who see Boko’s 2019 parliamentary defeat as a disqualifier for serious presidential contenders.
The UDC lost the 2014 and 2019 general polls with him at the helm and if he loses again in 2024, Boko will have a hard time convincing people that he is not a loser. As he mounts a comeback attempt without a constituency burden hanging over his shoulders, Boko knows that he needs more than just improbable victory but he has to defy political gravity as well.
Nonpartisan analysts believe Boko’s fallout with his deputy and the Botswana Congress Party (BCP) president, Dumelang Saleshando, has injected a major element of uncertainty about opposition parties already. Saleshando has gone all out to share that the UDC is a one-man show run by Boko who wants to be the natural leader of the UDC and that the latter uses a constitutional clause that has not allowed internal elections for more than a decade.
Now that Saleshando is out of the way after being suspended for his public comments last year, Boko’s frontrunner status as the UDC president seems to be safe.
The BCP is on its way out of the umbrella and none of the remaining coalition presidents would dare challenge Boko. Even if they do want to challenge Boko, it is highly unlikely that the UDC could hold an elective congress before the general election. Boko has a seemingly unshakeable grip on the UDC thus it would be up to him to use that to sway public opinion about opposition politics and attract votes. He has welcomed the Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF) into the coalition and recently the AP has shown interest in joining the UDC after dumping the BCP and the Botswana Labour Party therefore he is dealing with a great number of coalition political changes.
“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,” he has acknowledged.
But Boko’s decision not to contest for an MP seat is a game changer and definitely shapes the race that will be critical to watch in the months ahead.
As the front man selling his party to the voters, his candidates’ electability is going to be a huge factor as he tries to win back constituencies the UDC lost to the BDP in 2019 as well as retain those they wrestled off the long-standing ruling party. Speaking of selling the UDC to the voters, Boko is a man who does not want the party’s dirty linen being washed in public no wonder Saleshando and the BCP secretary-general, Goretetse Kekgonegile were suspended for ‘bad mouthing’ the coalition.
“What Saleshando and Kekgonegile did was to put down the UDC. What they did was equal to standing on the streets and ridiculing the UDC. Most of these demeaning words go to the same voters we want them to vote for us in 2024. This is unacceptable because we are the campaigners of the UDC who ask for people’s votes and we want to show Batswana the worth of the UDC,” he said at the time. Looking back to the 2019 General Election, Boko, who was the incumbent legislator, lost the Gaborone Bonnington North constituency after managing 4,495 votes to the winner Annah Mokgethi’s 6,933. Now that Boko no longer has to worry about his constituents in Gaborone Bonnington North, nothing can draw his attention further away from the main task at hand, winning the 2024 General Election. The man who hosted one of the biggest launches on the eve of the 2019 General Election only to lose to Mokgethi, now has nothing that can suck up valuable time that could be spent on the campaign trail.
Moreover, handpicking candidates and constituency allocation for each member affiliate in the coalition could bring back lost voters or push them further away.
Recent allegations that he wanted to sell the country to his friend and South African businessman, Zunaid Moti are not enough to cloud his campaign but could determine whether the UDC attracts the all-important donors as the election campaigns dig into his party’s pockets. A general election naturally presents serious financial challenges for parties on the fundraising front. Even though it was recommended by the commission last year to introduce political party funding, nothing has been done yet and chances are that parties will need sizeable war chests to fund these upcoming election campaigns. Boko recently made damning allegations that the BDP threatens and blackmails donors who want to fund the opposition, something that the BDP has since denied. He blamed the BDP and local businesses for putting him in a situation where he had to seek financial assistance from outside Botswana.
Having been at the helm of the coalition since its inception 11 years ago, the Botswana National Front (BNF) leader has to show that the UDC coalition is not just a party of fealty to him. The candidates who could carve his way to the State House need just about every voter so he cannot afford to alienate any of them. It is worth noting that Boko will not be just facing the BDP but he will potentially go up against his suspended deputy Saleshando and that is certainly going to split votes, something that worries the opposition dearly.
Boko will be launching most if not all of his candidates and without a constituency, he faces multiple tasks as he tries to identify the BDP and other rival parties’ pain points. While Boko’s 2019 controversial ‘magogajase’ comments during a presidential debate somewhat painted him as some sort of hardened intimidator, he has to choose whether to implant another personality or squeeze his opponents’ pain points. He recently outlined that his party is not about to dwell on petty issues like other parties.
Boko does not exactly have a myriad of demerits as a candidate but he has a duty to make sure that his candidates do not. Although the voters in party primaries decide on who gets to go to the general election under the party ticket, Boko knows he needs peculiar strengths from his candidates to see this out.