GCC bans Saleshando adverts
Oarabile Mosikare | Friday April 25, 2014 15:23
However, the case failed to proceed yesterday as the party lawyers and leadership were met with closed doors at the Gaborone High Court.
On Tuesday, the GCC lawyer Sono Seisa wrote to the BCP about the display of illegal advertisements on the street poles along Kgalemang T Motsete road and traffic intersections.
“Your flagrant breach of the Gaborone City Council ‘Guidelines for Erection and Maintenance of Hoarding and Advertising Signs’ [revised in October 2009 and further revised in July 2011] displayed or caused to be displayed an advertisement of the Botswana Congress Party on street light poles when such is strictly forbidden,” wrote Seisa.
Seisa also said one of the penalties prescribed for such violation is that when an individual or company persistently puts up advertisement signs or hoardings without approval of council, the municipality will black out that company/individual and will not allow them to advertise any longer.
“We are now putting you on notice that should you have not removed the said advertisement by 12 noon on April 22, 2014, we shall instruct private attorneys without further notice to you to obtain a court order for the removal of same by a private contractor and you shall be liable to pay full costs and fees therefore,” the GCC lawyer wrote.
In an interview yesterday, Saleshando said they were served with papers late afternoon to appear before Justice Dr Key Dingake.
But when they got to the Gaborone High Court, it was closed for the day. “Even the council lawyers were not there,” said the BCP president. He wondered why they had been targeted as it was not the first time parties display campaign posters and nobody has ever been prosecuted for that.
“We have not committed any crime. We are just being harassed before the launch of our manifesto,” said the Gaborone Central Member of Parliament, whose launch and that of the manifesto is the subject of the contentious posters.
The manifesto among other things decries the free fall of the economy, crisis in water and power, corruption and mismanagement, unemployment, aggrieved workforce and unhappy Batswana. The launch will be held Maruapula complex in Gaborone on Saturday.