Inside the media�s war on secrecy in Botswana
Richard Moleofe | Friday July 11, 2014 12:28
The US government became a real turncoat on this matter as they similarly declared war on the whistle blower group and many others. The Wikileaks had just been earlier praised by the US Secretary of State at the time, Hillary Clinton on the afore mentioned effort of whistle blowing. In her remarks she described the Wikileaks as a vision of semi-underground digital publishing – “the samizdat of our day”-that was beginning to champion transparency and challenge the autocratic, corrupt old order of the world. But she also warned that repressive governments would “target the independent thinkers who use the tools”. She had regimes like Iran and North Korea in mind but never her own country the United States. This statement came right after Assange and his group had revealed and published a secret report on the siphoning off hundreds of millions of pounds of government money by Kenya’s former president Daniel Arap Moi and where the funds had been hidden in overseas banks.
At the time when this drama played itself out in public domain, I was on holiday in a number of countries in South East Asia trying to deflate (go a ntsha mowa) my military gratuity after my retirement from Botswana Defence Force. At Hong Kong airport I picked up a book by David Leigh (who is The Guardian’s investigations editor in London) and Luke Harding (who is a Moscow correspondent for The Guardian) which chronicled how the whistle blowing was achieved. Under normal circumstances I am a slow reader but under the prevailing circumstances at the time I found myself finishing the book in the shortest possible time. It’s a good read but I got a little sick at the end of the read because I came to understand deeper the efforts of governments in trying to silence the media in its efforts to fight corruption through all other means including whistle blowing. There was tension in the air everywhere around the world as news channels were talking about Julian Assange and the Wikileaks. Many US right-wing libertarians were calling for his arrest and even his assassination. He clearly had fallen out of favour with the US government and Hillary Clinton had wished she never praised him. But there was no way she could swallow her statement.
After a series of leaks in this country about corruption and particularly that by intelligence officers, the media landscape will never be the same for better or for worse. I can foresee the advent of new draconian media laws that infringe on the freedom of the media rushed through parliament in November if the BDP wins the upcoming general elections. So at this time the security of the media fraternity rests with the decision of the public come October 2014. It is alarming how government is agitated by the reporting on the aspects of corruption to a point where they get so incensed with every article that comes out on either the print or electronic media. The reporting has made a lot of people in government very uncomfortable and there is a reason behind this level of discomfort. They surely have got something to hide.
The interesting factor with the current spate of leaks and reporting on corruption by the media in this country is that no single newspaper or radio has been left behind in beaming this news. Hence no single publishing house or radio station can be made to suffer the consequences alone. Our government has since grown and reached new levels of arrogance and continuously dismisses the media as biased and bitter in their pursuit of business. Government will in this case not achieve imposing sanctions on a particular publishing house because they are all in it. And that is good for our democracy.
When I was serving and defending democracy at BDF, I was in charge of a large fund for the fight against HIV. The BDF AIDS Programme is funded through the US Office of Security Corporation and the Americans are really dedicated to pouring in millions of dollars into the programme as results are showing. Unlike with other government institutions, the sky was the limit in my spending on the SEKWATA campaign. One day I was issued with a list of newspapers that we were not supposed to make business with and when I asked for reasons I was told they were unfriendly to government and therefore had to be starved off business. It was one of my saddest days in my service for my country. But I had to oblige because the order came from a high office in the land. Half a decade down the line we now see a concerted effort by the media to root out corruption and none is blinking in this course.
As a republican, I always go deep into such matters as to establish the benefits of any such actions to what may be termed as public benefit. I am compelled to make such a statement because as is the case now in Botswana, people are fearful of their own government through the actions of its intelligence apparatus within its disposal. As is the case now in the UK, seven international internet service providers have lodged legal actions against the government for breaching the right to privacy. They are taking this legal action against the state because of what the companies regard as a serious breach of privacy. The complaint has been lodged with the UK Investigatory Powers Tribunal, an oversight body which is responsible for monitoring the activities of all investigatory and intelligence organs.
“It is always inappropriate to do blanket mass surveillance because government investigation in a democratic society always comes based on the premise of the suspicion of some wrong doing. The suspicion that someone is doing wrong and has to be investigated always forms the foundation for any such need for surveillance. When you have such mass data collection, there can be no assumptions, no such premise of targeted wrong doers and hence the government must be held to account for such nature of its deeds.
*Richard Moleofe is a retired
military officer.