Ours has become a government by false pretences

Kgosietsile Ngakaagae | Friday July 9, 2021 13:22

There is no sense of responsibility, whatsoever. There is no ownership of faults and shortcomings. We are ruled by the blame game.

Let us start here; I am tired of the “Khama this, Khama that”, brigade. I have come to the conclusion that Khama is just an excuse for the ruling party’s huffing and puffing. I mean, how exactly, does the man interfere, with employment creation? How, exactly, does he interfere with land allocation? How does he interfere with citizen economic empowerment? How does he aid the spread of the coronavirus? How exactly does he contribute to power outages?

Our government must stop its Khama pretexes, and focus on delivery. Khama is not an impediment to its rule. The other day, someone asked if Khama had taken the jab. Well, what if he simply doesn’t want to? What if he is a conscious objector? In any case, how is that anyone’s business? Granted, the man is a politician, but, that is how he became President of the country, anyway. It is, nothing knew.

He never signed to any pact that he would leave politics for good, and if he believes, in any way, that he has been given the shorter end of the stick, by those he previously worked with, he has every right to break ranks, and to seek their ouster. It is just the way politics is. After all, the ruling party Cabinet boasts of former opposition cadres who were once, violently opposed to it.

The present government, is fast becoming a government of pretexes and untruths. When President Masisi first made the hue and cry about the transition not having been smooth, the nation gave him attention, believing that he had a genuine case. Looking back, I don’t know what transition was disrupted, let alone how same was disrupted.

The transition happened on his inauguration, and not a single State institution was excluded from his control. Even if the former regime, still had loyalists in influential government positions, it was all within his power to remove them. And boy, he did. There was never, any armed struggle. On hindsight, the issue about transition was just, another pretext.

The other day there was a hue and cry about the man having bought off street advertising for a Dalai Lama related advert. Government, was livid. Apparently, Khama is not supposed to differ with the current government’s diplomatic positions. Yet, the man has been very consistent on the issue.

The government knows all too well, where he stands, and that he would not back down. After all, ours is a democracy and China, is not. It was for the government, to seek understanding with China on the issue, and allow him to exercise his constitutional rights. No citizen is mortgaged to national diplomatic policy, or position.

For example, we are all entitled to differ with our government, on the Swazi issue. And Khama, is a citizen. That the man is a former president doesn’t change the price of pork. Who said former presidents cannot express private views or that they can only do so in memoirs?

But that is not all. Right now we are on a perpetual and needless state of public emergency. The nation has been under a rule by decree for 16 months and indications are that the President will seek for an extension of the same for reasons only himself knows. I have said it before, and I say it again. The state of emergency has become just another false pretence, for non-delivery.

The state of emergency has brought us more coronavirus, more corruption, more unemployment, less democracy, and more deaths. It is just another false pretence, to justify a power grab and to make people believe government is on top of its game. Yet, it has been the most unrewarding and toxic time in the history of our country. Instead of things getting better, they have gotten worse.

Then, fancy this; realising that efforts against the virus aren’t working and bodies were piling on account of a snail-paced vaccination campaign, our leaders had to find another false pretence. They blamed the people and they blamed alcohol. They never pointed a finger at themselves and at law enforcement. They dramatically came up with decrees that wiped off livelihoods, whilst refusing to account for how alcohol contributes to the spread of the virus.

Ours has now become a government by false pretences, and by the blame game. Not long ago, government blamed civil servants for non-delivery. The President was on national television in what came to be known as the “reset speech”, and promised a purge of the civil service virtually blaming it for everything under the sun.

Not once did he blame his ministers or his ruling party policies. Yet we have the most skilled civil service anywhere. It is the same civil service on whose merits the ruling party government has been returned to power so many times.

Of course the reset was forgotten, soon as he left the mass media complex. As we speak, his spin-doctors are busy trying to find something to blame for the biting winter.