BDP welcomes back mekoko
Tsaone Basimanebotlhe | Wednesday November 4, 2015 15:45
The ruling party welcomed back seven former members, who included two parliamentary hopefuls, in its first olive branch move towards those resigned to go it alone in last year’s general elections.
Several BDP members, including high profile individuals, quit the party last year and ran as independents in the 2014 general elections, as a protest against their defeat in the party’s hotly contested primary elections.
Yesterday BDP secretary general, Botsalo Ntuane said that they had accepted five independent candidates who contested for council seats and two who had contested for parliamentary seats.
“It should be remembered that these seven members were our members before. They only resigned from the party in 2013 after primary elections to contest for general elections.
They are now back home and we have asked our party structures to welcome them,” Ntuane said. He said the two candidates who contested for MP seats are Neo Magowe and Onkabetse Daniel. Magowe stood in Mahalapye East while Daniel contested for Shashe West constituency. Magowe quit the party after losing the primary election to Botlogile Tshireletso, the assistant minister of local government and rural development.
In the primary, Tshireletso garnered 1,634, followed by Magowe with 887 votes. For his part, Daniel resigned after losing to Fidelis Molao, who is now the assistant minister of education. Molao received 3,234 in the primaries, while Daniel got 1,520. Both Magowe and Daniel appealed the results of the primaries but failed. Ntuane said the party was expecting even former members to return.
Meanwhile, the party’s deputy secretary general, Shaw Kgathi said a booklet on the Economic Stimulus Package is being prepared to inform Batswana about the initiative.
“We are still packaging the entire programme so that people can have answers on what it means. The booklet will be out soon,” he said.