Divisions rock BOFEPUSU
Tsaone Basimanebotlhe | Friday October 10, 2014 16:38
Yesterday the federation agreed to issue another press release rebutting what Mogwera had written.
The five unions that are affiliated to BOFEPUSU include National Amalgamated Local & Central Government & Parastatal Workers Union (NALCGPWU), Botswana Public Employees Union (BOPEU), Botswana Teachers’ Union (BTU), Botswana Sector of Educators’ Union (BOSETU) and Botswana Landboard and Local Authorities Workers Union (BLLAHWU).
A source revealed that it was resolved that the urgent meeting held inside the Botswana Teachers’ Union (BTU) boardroom and took over three hours, be rescheduled since Mogwera did not attend, and also that BOPEU felt that it was not well represented as not all their executive members attended.
At the meeting, BOFEPUSU executive committee distanced itself from Mogwera’s statement and wanted to know the person or people who gave Mogwera the mandate to write the statement.
In the meantime, even before she released the statement, the BOFEPUSU fight was already in the public domain. In her press release that was advertised in one of the local newspapers, Mogwera argued that at several BOFEPUSU gatherings, including the Letlhabile congress, the issue of party affiliation was raised and extensively dealt with.
“In both gatherings, it was resolved that BOFEPUSU was not going to align with any political formation.
“This resolution was informed by the recognition that as a mass movement with a broad base of people coming from different political orientations, it was going to be difficult for BOFEPUSU to align itself with any political party without infringing on our members’ rights to associate with an organisation of their choice.
“The closest we got regarding politics and elections was that members should vote for candidates who in their informed view represented the interests of the working class.
“I must now state that it was never a resolution of BOFEPUSU to support any political party let alone UDC,” she said in the press release.
On Wednesday, however, BOFEPUSU secretary general Tobokani Rari said their executive secretary has not met to discuss any issue with them as members of the executive committees.
He said the statement issued by Mogwera was not BOFEPUSU’s position.
“Our position as BOFEPUSU is very clear. If we have changed then we will call a press conference to that effect. Our members know which party they are supposed to vote.
“BOFEPUSU is the one which came up with the idea of Umbrella and we are going to support any party that is an Umbrella model,” Rari said.
Rari confirmed the meeting, though he was quick to say, “I cannot disclose any content of our meeting. We will issue a press statement.”
Mmegi has learnt that BOPEU was intending to pull out of BOFEPUSU for its public avowal to support UDC.
Since the onset of political campaigning, as parties gear for the 2014 general elections on October 24, BOFEPUSU has publicly called for the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) to be punished by their members on polling day.
The federation has increasingly become vocal in lobbying its members to vote out the BDP. What angered BOFEPUSU most is that the BDP president Ian Khama once announced that he did not care about public service workers during their mother of strikes in 2011.
BOFEPUSU also urged its workers not to vote for Botswana Congress Party (BCP) president Dumelang Saleshando because his party pulled out from the Umbrella model after talks collapsed. Efforts to get comment from Mogwera were unsuccessful as she did not respond to text messages after she had requested that questions be transmitted to her.