Nata/Gweta constituents question nominations for Sowa Township
Ryder Gabathuse | Thursday November 13, 2014 12:40
At the centre of the villagers’ concerns is the dispensation for nominated councillors at the Sowa Township Authority, which villagers strongly feel the BDP leadership is abusing, as it seemingly rewards its friends after losing the general elections. This week villagers were fuming that for sometime now, they have been watching the Minister of Local Government rewarding friends of some ministers with nominations for a council seat at the Sowa Township Authority ignoring party functionaries within the Nata/Gweta constituency. Constituents are bitter that they incessantly plough their resources in the party’s campaigns during elections and only for ‘outsiders’ to be rewarded without a sweat.
They claim that past immediate area MP, Rayner Makosha was allegedly ousted in the BDP primaries because people strongly felt that he was the one who gave the Sowa Township Authority to outsiders.
They have reportedly vowed to resign from the BDP en masse, if the Minister of Local Government Prince Maele is going to nominate “his friends” again.
Newly elected MP for Nata/Gweta Polson Majaga revealed to Mmegi this week that irate constituents have written a letter of complaint to President Ian Khama, Local Government Minister, Slumber Tsogwane and copied the same to him (Majaga) pleading with them to take control of the situation. “The constituents are worried that the authorities take them lightly as they have been rewarding a lot of outsiders with council seats through nominations when there are capable people within the constituency who steadfastly work very hard for the party to be where it is, only to see outsiders running their affairs,” worried Majaga revealed in an interview.
“Ga re campaigna re a bo re le nosi ba seyo batho bateng (When we campaign in the constituency during elections all these people will be nowhere) only for them to come to be rewarded for our sweat,” observed the visibly concerned MP. The villagers had told Majaga to his face that if Minister Tsogwane and the BDP bigwigs are going to bring ‘strangers’ to Nata/Gweta again to run the Sowa Township Authority, then they are going to cross the floor to the opposition.
“When the BDP wins the elections in Nata/Gweta, the Minister imposes people on us and this thing now threatens to split us even further,” he said and noted that if the nominations were done in good faith, then as the area MP, he would be consulted as the man on the ground.
Majaga, previously a councillor in Nata/Gweta said in the campaigns for the October 24 general elections, he was almost a loner as those who were nominated in the previous term had returned to their respective areas to beef up campaigns there. “I am even preparing a motion to challenge the powers vested upon the Local Government Minister because it’s killing us in Nata/Gweta and ultimately it threatens to erode the good work we have done in the area,” bemoaned Majaga. He is mainly worried by the fact that Sowa Township is lagging behind in developments because civic leaders nominated to serve the area did not contribute effectively to the development of the township.
Former Nata/Gweta MP, Oliphant Mfa described the latest developments in the constituency as unfortunate and a sign that the authorities undermined the MPs. “This is a very painful exercise, and I can tell you these things never happened during my tenure as an MP for the area,” said Mfa who added that an ideal situation is where the Minister of Local Government works closely with the area MP who knows the people in the constituency.
“I have done that with different Ministers before and although there is no proper explanation with the Nata/Gweta case, I want to blame the Minister for the whole saga,” he said.
Mfa is of the view that when Ministers undermine the area MPs, they do as they wish.
“Why did it not happen during my tenure?” he wondered, and added why, the law has not been amended since he left, is it happening in Sowa Town?” He added further that in the previous term, the Sowa Town mayor was from Mmadinare/Selebi-Phikwe whilst his deputy was from Tonota, other councillors were from as far as Tswapong and other areas in the country.
“Whenever these councillors attended council business they claimed huge mileage for using their motor vehicles whilst Nata/Gweta has capable people who continue to be overlooked. In fact, all the nominated people did not possess any special skills,” fumed Mfa.
BDP executive secretary, Sechele Sechele told Mmegi in an interview yesterday that he has not received a letter from the Nata/Gweta constituents complaining about nominated councillors for the Sowa Township Authority.
“I have not seen such a letter and if they have written it, it means they may not have addressed it to me but to specific people,” he declared yesterday.