Butale wants ouster stay
Innocent Selatlhwa | Monday August 21, 2023 06:00
Butale has further filed an urgent application for stay of execution of Justice Zein Kebonang's judgement which confirmed his suspension and expulsion from the party.
As if that was not enough, he has filed a review application to re-look into his suspension and expulsion. While he waits, Butale has yet again approached court on urgency to stay the execution and implementation of the decisions of the BPF and its National Executive Committee (NEC). Butale wants stay of the decisions of BPF and its NEC to suspend and expel him communicated in letters dated July 4, 2023 and July 13, 2023 respectively.
He said the application seeks to stay these decisions pending the finalisation of the review application, which he said is live before court. The respondents in the current matter are the BPF, its NEC and current President Mephato Reatile.
Through his notice of motion, Butale wants an order directing and ordering that the matter be heard as one of urgency and that the ordinary rules of court relating to times, forms and methods of service be dispensed with in dealing with this matter as one of urgency.
He also wants a rule nisi issued returnable as soon as the matter may be heard, calling upon the respondents to appear and show cause why an order should not be made in the following terms: "The Applicant be and is hereby granted a stay of the execution and implementation of the decisions of the BPF and its NEC purportedly made and/or recommended by the Disciplinary Committee of the party on July 4, 2023 and July 13, 2023 respectively, to suspend and expel him as member of the Respondent and/or as the party president, pending the final end and determination of the review application filed simultaneously herewith to set aside the suspension and expulsion of the Applicant before the court", reads his court papers.
Furthermore the papers say, "the respondents are interdicted from taking any steps to organise an election or to appoint and/or approve any other person or candidate as party president other than the applicant; alternatively if any such appointment is already extant, then such appointee be and is hereby interdicted from discharging the functions of the office of president of the BPF and/or otherwise hold himself out to be president of the BPF''. Directing and ordering the BPF, its NEC and its disciplinary committee to despatch and deliver the complete and full record of the proceedings to the Registrar and to the Applicant's attorneys of and/or in relation to and/or in connection with the decisions to suspend and expel the Applicant as member and/or as the Party President of the BPF within seven days hereof.
“I had sought to vindicate my rights as a member and president of the BPF through litigation in terms of a case which was dismissed by Justice Kebonang of the Gaborone High Court. Notably I caused the filing of that matter on the 14th July 2023 a day after the decision to expel me was reached. That matter was adjudged urgent and I contend that despite having not been successful in the merits, the urgency has not dissipated. In fact I have since appealed against the decision and the Appeal is pending before the Court of Appeal,” he wrote in his founding affidavit. In any event, Butale deposed that the facts that precipitate this urgent application are not limited to the Respondents impugned decisions, but include continuing and ongoing conduct of the BPF NEC and acting on the strength of the said decisions. Butale deposed that the matter is urgent in that the BPF NEC under the leadership of Reatile are currently running and involved in the affairs of the BPF and continue to make major decisions for and on behalf of the association. “In the course of their functions, the BPF NEC led by Reatile have access to funds of the BPF and are in all likelihood intent on using such funds for redundant purposes aimed at undermining resolutions and other actions lawfully taken under my tenure as BPF President. To amplify the above, the NEC and Butale have called and/or purported to convene a party congress slated for this September, whereas a party congress has just recently been held and conducted in April 2023 the decisions and resolutions of which will invariably be altered or otherwise fettered by the Respondents,” he stated. Butale further submits that the Respondents have embarked on several party activities in total disobedience of orders of two judges of the High Court, Justice Michael Motlhabi and Matlhogonolo Phuthego.
In this regard, Butale states he does not need not do more than refer to a memorandum issued and signed by Reatile dated August 8, 2023. Butale states that Respondents have purported to make resolutions with far reaching consequences including co-opting individuals to the party NEC, making pronouncements on the conduct of primary elections and the calling of an extraordinary congress. He states that in other instances legitimate party members and office bearers are being arbitrarily removed from their office by the NEC and Reatile. “The Party's Secretary for Constitutional and Legal Affairs Osego Mapiki has confirmed to me that no legitimate meetings of the BPF NEC have actually been called so the suggestion that she has missed three successive meetings is merely a plot to create vacancies that infact do not exist. This is despite the fact that judges Motlhabi and Phuthego’s orders remain extant and unchallenged by the Respondents who contemptuously ignore such orders, or at best just wish them away,” he wrote. In the event that the High Court agrees with him and eventually grants the reliefs that he seeks in the review application, Butale states his term of office will evidently be exposed to various accountabilities for the acts of the NEC captained by Reatile.
Butale depose that the prejudice that he stand to suffer is overwhelming, incalculable and urgent. He submits only an order obtained on the basis of the present application can avoid this harm to him. “I will definitely not be afforded substantial redress at a hearing in due course in view of the fact that what is in issue is actually a continuing harm for which legal tools such as an urgent interdict were in fact specifically designed. If I were only to be afforded a hearing in due course by the time of arrival of such a hearing, the very object which the present application is trying to achieve will be incapable of achievement. The harm which the continued unlawful conduct of the 2nd and 3rd Respondents will precipitate will certainly be beyond measure and incapable of precise or other determination,” he submits.