Molefhabangwe's sacking could rekindle prospects for a serious opposition

| Friday July 3, 2009 00:00

The 'theoreticians' of the time said that the 'front' model of political organisation takes direction from a vanguard party, vaguely referred to at the Botswana National Front (BNF) as a 'core' group of sorts.

The reason, it becomes evident in retrospect, was for fear that forthright pronouncement of the leadership role of a vanguard party would have required the formation of such a party, which, if it was to oppose the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP), would have had to be socialist in its ideological world view.

The BDP, who confuse the name the organisation was given, for its ideological content, referring to members as 'democrats', had long sorted out their allegiances. 

Even as they floundered with slogans over which they had little control such as 'non-racialism' and 'Pula', at the core, the leaders believed that the new Botswana should emulate British capitalism, distinguishable from its American progeny by its tendency towards welfarism, as opposed to the rabid individualism that glorified the achievement of profit even if it came at the cost of greater human suffering among the majority o the citizens, workers.

By the way, the Scandinavians have done much better at welfarism than the British, and they rate among the most developed social models that promote development for the majority.

So, it did not require Kenneth Koma's genius, often exaggerated by the shoulder rubbers and social climbers who believed that somehow his intelligence would rub off on them merely by saying 'Yes' to everything he uttered, to determine that 'vanguard' could only have meant 'socialist' party.There was a good chance that the socialist party would have quickly established good roots then because: -

.There still existed a 'socialist bloc' even if there was heated debate even among the socialists themselves, some favouring the Soviet type, others the Chinese, some the Leninist and others the Trotskyite whilst on the African continent, there prevailed wholesale confusion about the types of socialisms that were suitable for the Africans, ranging from Nkrumah's 'Consciensism' and Julius Nyerere's 'Ujamaa' on the more sensible end, and Kenneth Kaunda's 'Humanism' and Mobutu Sese Seko's 'Africanism' on the lunatic fringe.  That leaves out the Francophone and Portuguese forms of African socialism, not out of discrimination, but for lack of space!
.The liberation movement in southern Africa had received the 'socialist' model as a viable model, if only because it was the socialist countries that gave theoretical, material and spiritual assistance to the anti-colonialist movement.
.The very condition of the Batswana, who benefitted the least from the cruel British colonialism that cultivated a relatively prosperous elite among the Kenyans and the Nigerians who nevertheless opted for tribal savagery, also giving a new meaning to the definition of corruption, could only have been ameliorated by determined state intervention in almost every area of economic and cultural endeavour.  The Batswana were the poorest of the poor and the country was counted among the 10 least developed countries in the world at independence. (State intervention of the socialist type should not be confused with the 'one-party state' advocated for by the early post independence rulers who argued that it was consistent with the African culture of kings and serfs.  What they really meant, is that they wanted unlimited terms of office as heads of state! There were no diamonds yet, and the cattle had no Pula.
. From a strategic vantage point, the socialist pursuit would have established the opposition as fundamentally opposed to capitalist exploitation, feudal relations of production and the 'Third World' system of neo-colonialism.  This in stark contrast to the BDP which preferred baby-sitting of imperialism and cultivation of a small elite similar in character and number to that in the northern African countries that gained nominal political independence earlier.

It will be left to the political scientists of a left leaning to recount the other reasons.  The factors that appeared to operate against establishment of a socialist 'vanguard' party would have been; -
.Fear among the early ideologues of the BNF that they would assist the anti-communists in Botswana and South Africa with a ready stereotype that would tar them away from potential supporters who were already schooled in the language and culture of apartheid,
. Ethnic and economic identity of the leaders of the Front with the small group that led the BDP. All of who saw opportunity in joining the civil service, running huge cattle ranches, opening bottle stores and retail shops, buying and stealing land for real estate development and taking a breather from the struggle.
.The British had failed to create a communications, roads and financial infrastructure that would help to connect the workers along the railway line and the Basarwa who herded the cattle of the Afrikaners also looking after the farms of the African nascent intelligentsia. 

The north was disconnected to the south and the west from the east.  Feudal relations of production assisted in promoting ethnic allegiance to the chiefs, rather than to republican democracy.
.The political oppression of the Batswana was not as evident - or even material - to the leaders and populations of the Western industrialised countries whose main interests were to guard against the spread of communism, and to cultivate prospects for capitalist expansion in the region. 

Molefhabangwe's sacking could rekindle prospects for a serious opposition
That left Botswana outside of the radar of the capitalists, relegating the country only to a buffer for the British against Portuguese, Dutch and German hegemony in southern Africa; and

* The older Botswana Peoples Party (BPP) and the Botswana Independence Party (BIP), despite their wrangling over money and leadership, also opposed socialism, and offered the toss of a coin, they would have preferred Seretse over Koma, who threatened to usurp Phillip Matante's and Mpho Motsamai's positions as leaders of the opposition.  Playing possum on the question of socialism would help to build the already divided opposition, the BNF leaders dreamt.

The leaders of the opposition gave themselves to the pervasive notion that Seretse Khama was better than British colonialism, and that with all his faults, he would serve as a useful conduit for the sympathy of the capitalist countries and the donor community which virtually ran the Botswana economy, also protecting the country against the expansionist plans of apartheid South Africa who had already stolen at least half of Batswana land at independence in 1966.

So, BNF leaders opted against a socialist vanguard, preferring the reformist position from where they would help to guide the BDP towards a more friendly capitalism.

That position left the BNF, ill-resourced, and as a result, hopelessly disorganised and vulnerable to the emergence of political stardom of the Hollywood type among the leaders.  It exposed the organisation to the festering of cultism and worship of idols, all of which would have been discouraged in a vanguard party, but lauded if they assisted the deification of Kenneth Koma.

The 'Front', having failed to establish a vanguard, retired into electoral populism, at every juncture, denying its socialist inspired ideological roots, also defending Koma against accusations that he was a student of Soviet communism, which in fact he never was!

At the freedom squares, the most eloquent of the campaigners for Parliament and council developed a vocabulary and stock phrases of denial, which have outlived Koma himself whilst also immortalising the man.

'The Front is not like any other party,' the leaders sing when they are asked for their beliefs.  'We are neither socialist nor capitalist. We are not for the workers or the employers...otherwise, where would that leave the unemployed, the old and the infirm?' spokespeople ask the inquirer. This ideological indecisiveness is affirmed in the failure of the organisation to take sides with the Manual Workers Union, among which the Front enjoys wide voter support, when they go on strike for 'a decent living wage'.  The First People of the Kgalagadi confronted the government over relocation at the Central Kgalagadi Game Reserve (CKGR) without a clear statement from the leadership of the BNF.

The Front then, having failed to establish a vanguard, also failed to identify itself with independent civil society institutions and groupings which would have looked to the organisation for the political articulation of their fragmented social programmes.

In the end, the Front lived up to its contrived personality of  'a mass organisation' with neither vanguard nor covenant with any clearly defined civil society constituency.  Bereft of the charisma of Koma, devoid of any appeal for the women who might have listened to Kathleen Letshabo, also having catapulted the Botswana Youth Federation into oblivion, and having shed the few personalities - Nehemiah Modubule, Karlmon Mogalakwe, Akanyang Magama - who held some credibility with the socialists, and also without empathy of the opposition parties with whom it should be united against the ruling party, the BNF goes to the '09 general election with only one asset, a job opportunity.

A government job is probably the only thing that is at stake for Robert Molefhabangwe, who was recently sacked for insubordination.   That is, if the BNF still remains a good underwriter for a job at council or Parliament.

Molefhabangwe will be counted among the 'The Last of The Mohicans' after whose departure, two things could follow: complete dismantling of the Front left, paving way for redesign of the organisation to suit the idiosyncrasies of its leader Otsweletse Moupo and a handful of his political fans, or otherwise, deliberate collapse of the Front so that its leaders, former study group veterans and KK admirers take their place in the queue to take jobs from Ian Khama's regime. The process has already started

In either event, that should lead to more serious contemplation of the proper establishment of an opposition that will rekindle the prospect of a living alternative government.