Moono Wa Baithuti, UB Progressives call for unity among opposition
Nnasaretha Kgamanyane | Thursday May 6, 2021 19:30
Addressing the media recently, Legase said the only way for the opposition to win elections in 2024 and rule this country was when all opposition parties could unite and fight against the ruling Botswana Democratic Party rather than fighting each other. Legase further stated that Moono-Wa-Baithuti is able to win all 13 seats during the recent UB Student Representative Committee (SRC) after liaising with UB Progressives.
“We were contesting against two parties and a few independent candidates but managed to win all the 13 seats. This was the first time in the history of Moono-Wa-Baithuti to have scooped all the seats. This shows that students' trust in the movement. We had many votes than in the past years.”
“Students are sending a very clear message to the ruling party that they are not happy with the way it is doing things. We won by a margin of 2000. We should be happy with students’ legitimate believe in us. Batswana should copy this and take drastic steps in coming years and vote for change,” he said.
He further dismissed allegations that they pushed UBCD-BPC out of the movement saying that they engaged them when in talks of joining hands with UB Progressives. He added, they jointly agreed on the vetting process where they later chose five members whom amongst them were two representatives from UB BNF, two members from UBCD and one from UB Progressives. Unfortunately, he said members from UBCD pulled out.
He however, explained that despite everything that transpired during and after the elections, they would like to continue working with UBCD-BCP emphasising that the UB Progressives did not join Moono-Wa-Baithuti but are working with them for the year term as per their agreement.
“We are surprised that senior officials in the UDC are blowing this issue through different media platforms saying there is a problem within the UDC at UB. It is wrong, why do they want to make it look like there is an issue in the UDC when there were problems in one cell, which is Moono Wa Baithuti? We are not going to condone that. We cannot be used to fight whatever problems are at national level.. We are members of the UDC, but due to lack of guidance we have to make decisions in the best interest of the students,” he explained.
For his part, Kelebale emphasised that UB Progressives were not members of Moono-Wa-Baithuti saying that they were still an independent organization. He said they came into agreement with Moono Wa Baithuti because they wanted a untied opposition with the same objective of winning against UB BDP.
“We did not want to push out any party. As UB Progressive we are not into Moono-Wa-Baithuti but we work together. We are not part of UDC and remain an independent cell. We never fought UBCD and have no hidden motive. We want to bring a united opposition for oppositions. Something we hope our mother parties to copy in order to win against the ruling party,” he ended.