Will BCP man be second time lucky?

GALE NGAKANE
Correspondent | Friday August 14, 2009 00:00

Sitting at his vast desk at Moseki Attorneys on second floor behind First National Bank Mall Branch, the lawyer said this week that the situation in the constituency is fluid and he is going to exploit this to win. 'There is so much crime and there is no delivery of services by the council. One might ask where I am going to find money for all these. All it takes is proper budgeting and allocating of the funds accordingly,' he said.

Moseki came second with 1,419 votes behind Botswana Democratic Party's Skelemani who had 3,255 in the 2004 elections. Kumbulani William of Botswana Peoples Party (BPP) polled 869 votes. It remains to be seen whether Moseki can exploit the divisions in the BDP to his advantage, especially given the fact that his party has joined forces with the Botswana Alliance Movement (BAM) and National Democratic Front (NDF).

Morgan Captain Mojiwa Moseki was born in Tutume 'Ka Madandume' on March 18, 1956. Besides his profession as an Attorney-At-Law, his CV indicates that he is a politician. The former police officer is a practicing Christian with General Foundation Apostolic Church in Christ. 'I never miss a chance to go to church, especially on Sundays,' he said.

Moseki has a LLM degree from the University of Cape Town. He obtained his junior degree in law from the University of Wales College of Cardiff in the United Kingdom. He worked for the Botswana Police, Gaborone City Council and the High Court before he ventured into private practice. He said that in school he had a flair for behavioural sciences and studying law never crossed his mind. 'I kept a book called 'Beyond Freedom and Dignity' by B.F. Skinner whose taste was so good that I treated it like one would a Bible. Some works were 'On Liberty' by John Stuart Mills and the like. My destiny had always been in politics and I wanted to do a degree in that subject. As fate would have it, it seems I have acquired it from Freedom Squares,' he said.

His pitch is that Francistown East has been degenerating since 2003. 'There is no job security for workers. Despite promising to change labour laws to protect workers from being sacked by employers at will, the current MP has failed to do so because it is a BDP agenda to protect employers not workers. Women who try to sell tomatoes, vegetables and airtime on the busy streets in town are arrested and have their tomatoes seized by council officials,' he said.

He asserted that because the BDP has the majority in Parliament, it dictates and regulates how its MPs debate. He said BDP MPs who fail to toe the line are threatened with expulsion from the party. 'BDP caucuses have killed parliamentary freedom to debate issues without fear. Those BDP MPs who cross the line are threatened with expulsion,' he said.

He added that to vote for BDP is a waste of time because its MPs do not have the freedom to represent the people. 'Under the BDP, Parliament has become a joke where each MP is given only 15 minutes to debate bills which later become laws. If elected I shall work in collaboration with your elected councilors and wards development committees to map out a development strategy for your Constituency. Each councilor will develop his or her own strategic five-year plan for the short and most critical and long-term goals and objectives to take your wards a scale higher,' he said.

Moseki said BCP policies are based on social justice for all. The aim of the party is to raise standards of living of the poor. 'The BCP and BAM believe that education is the sure way to success. We therefore aim to give it a priority and kick out BDP Bantu education from our system.