Merafhe's last words
Baboki Kayawe | Friday April 3, 2015 18:00
The General: In the Service of My Country: an autobiography of the late Mompati Sebogodi Merafhe was launched yesterday at the Gaborone International Convention Centre (GICC), in the presence of legislatures, former policy makers as well as business people. The 204 paged book chronicles the life of the statesman who served in the civil service for 52 years.
Below is a compilation of intriguing and thought provoking issues Merafhe addresses;
Factionalism within the Botswana Democratic Party
Merafhe writes that sub-allegiances will always be part of any organised grouping, no matter how closely knit it is. He adds that occasional rifts and feuds, spats and squabbles, are inevitable in a group of any kind.
“Differences of views become a problem when they erupt into outright hostilities and threaten to tear the group apart; when virtual parties form within a party. That is exactly what happened to the BDP.”
Factions, he says, have been synonymous with the party since the 1990s. Merafhe reveals that the situation was severe such that the BDP was nearly thrown out in the 1994 general elections.
“If we had not been the founding government and if our economy had been a basket case, the electorate would have sent us packing in the 1994 elections without much ado,”
He takes on former president Sir Ketumile Masire, who in his memoirs, Very Brave or Very Foolish, points at Merafhe and Kwelagobe for stocking the flames of factionalism within BDP. Merafhe attests that factionalism came as far back as founding Seretse Khama’s era, just that it became “more voluble, more bellicose and much more discernible.”
Namibia and Sedudu Island
Of the near war territorial dispute between Botswana and Namibia, Merafhe says the resolution of the conflict marked the two countries’ ability to differences peacefully.
He says when the verdict was announced, Botswana leaders did not pop champagne bottles, rather, he promptly made a parliamentary statement in which he underlined that, and “Nobody has lost What has won is our ability as Batswana and Namibians to resolve differences peacefully”.
Merafhe took to the helm of the Foreign Affairs ministry in 1994, at a time when the northern Botswana Island dispute, which started in 1991, was unresolved.
Ever since that issue, he notes the states have since enjoyed excellent relations.
Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR) and Survival International (S)I
Merafhe charges that Survival International (SI) has ensured that it makes as much capital, both literally and figuratively, from the CKGR case as possible as it was almost unheard of before the matter.
“It was established in 1969 but until the CKGR case, it was almost unknown,” he writes.
He says from 2001 onwards, the Basarwa affair was amplified into the international sphere, and it capitalised on the opportunity to make a “human rights and aid industry” from the case.
“To the discerning, however, it was clear that it was not the circumstances of the Basarwa that it was interested in but its own bottom line. Survival International had to strike while the iron was hot, while the CKGR case was making waves across the globe,”
Merafhe adds that SI’s tactics were aggressive, malicious and subversive. He rubbishes the organisation for vilifying Botswana government without seeking to engage in dialogue. He adds that as Foreign Affairs minister he was galled that wherever he set foot overseas, he had to answer for Botswana’s treatment of Basarwa.
Relations with the media
Though he admits the democratic value of the media, as the forth branch of government, as well as the editorial power it wields, Merafhe says the media misinforms rather than informs.
He bashes the media for selective reportage, “cherry picking”, and that, he says made the media partial and far from being objective. As vice-president, he says he was one of the favourite targets of pernicious reporting. He uses the famous “One or Two Shootings Not Bad-Merafhe”, headline after the killing of John Kalafatis as a case in which an innocuous response was sensationalised.
On independence of the press, he says the ball is in the media’s court if they want to enjoy unrestricted freedom. The currency for this, he says lied in upholding the accuracy, objectivity and impartiality.