Country slips while Khama sleeps!

Mmegi Editor | Wednesday March 12, 2014 15:10

 

Never before, has, in this country, darkness beaten light; things are bad! Darkness continues to engulf the country almost every evening, unabated!

This was after the South African utility company Eskom decided to cut Botswana from its grid. While the people are generally angry, the leadership of the motherland is conspicuous in its silence. President Ian Khama is nowhere to be found when the nation is reeling in gloom.  He is detached; carefree and completely indifferent.

How else should we think of him if we cannot see his reflection on Batswana’s teardrops; to indicate his closeness to the situation at hand? We can go about and condemn Batswana’s silence all we like but in all honest we should be worried. In all truth the silence is too loud. Batswana are bottling their wailing and it is high time someone listens.

The captain of the ship must rise up and be counted. But when did all this mess start, one may ask? Most of the current mess can be traced six years ago when Khama inherited the levers of power from former President Festus Mogae. Since then, it was a free fall as far as the strategic management and leadership of the country is concerned.

The state of the economic was hard hit and now there are white elephants all over the place. Instead of being creative, the government started throwing money at problems.  The Botswana International University of Science and Technology (BIUST) in Palapye only took off this year; after three years of blunt promises. The Botswana Development Corporation (BDC) sponsored glass manufacturing company in Palapye, with all its hopes, has been swallowed by the pangs of corruption.

The Chinese partner was found to be wanting as it turned out that he had sold the authorities a dummy. The Botswana Meat Commission (BMC) is now in shambles thanks to the previous management and board members that had turned the corporation into a cash cow, literally. The education sector is regressing into unprecedented levels and now produces poor results year after year without fail.

The Minister responsible has failed to diagnose the real problem and Khama, who has vowed to punish poor performers, is protecting her. The public health system is also undergoing a major crisis due to negligence. Most of the health posts in rural areas are in a state of dilapidation. 

Basic services are collapsing as we experience cases of water contamination, lack of power and water; and municipalities are failing to collect rubbish for weeks. The HIV is back to haunt Botswana. The statistics show that the prevalence rate of HIV amongst youth was 3,7 percent in 2008 and it is now at 10,3%. This was not the case during Mogae’s era.

Thanks to the current regime, Mogae’s HIV success story has been reversed tremendously. The least we talk about corruption that is on the rise the better. Khama should stand up and lead. Otherwise he is no different from other long serving African dictators, that he enjoys poking.  Please wake up, Mr. President!