Police set on Magosi's tail
Innocent Selatlhwa | Friday June 19, 2020 15:56
World of Oath is demanding P15 million from the directorate for apparent propaganda and spin-doctoring services secured for the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) in 2019 general elections.
The alleged threat-to-kill investigation follows whispers by some sources that the directors of World of Oath, Temo Tau and Benks Mabengano allegedly approached the police recently to report the threat-to-kill.
According to sources, after delivering the letter of demand to DIS and Attorney General, Magosi continued to call Tau and Mabengano threatening them.
“On the 11th June, their lawyers took them to Sir Seretse Khama International Airport (SSKIA) police to report a case of threat-to-kill against Magosi. The station commander felt that the case was beyond him and he referred the case to Police Headquarters. The Director Criminal Investigation Division (CID) and Director Criminal Intelligence Bureau (CRIB) were assigned to listen to the complaints and investigate the case.
Because of these threats that are motivated by the fact that Magosi is aware of the type of assignments he gave them and the amount of implicating evidence they have that they were used to work for the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP), they have run away, fearing for their lives,” a source said.
Police have denied claims that they are investigating Magosi for threat-to-kill relating to directors of World of Oath (Pty) Ltd.
SSKIA Police station commander, Assistant Superintendent Mpho Sebako confirmed they have met the men, but said no case was opened.
“I can confirm that one of them came here with their lawyer about the matter.
They however would not write a statement as per the procedure for registering a case. They said they would, but they never came back and as thus we do not have any case of threat-to-kill against Magosi,” he said.
DIS communication officer, Edward Robert said they were not aware of the matter. “No we are not aware of such. And I doubt such a case exists. But you are free to check with the police as they would be best placed to know if such a case exists. However, I had hoped that by this time you guys would have seen all these allegations against the Directorate for what they area; a sustained smear campaign targeting the head of DIS and the organisation he is leading,” Robert said.
“One minute it is about the Director General not fit to lead the organisation or him about to get fired from his job and the next minute is DIS owing unimaginable amount of money for a dirty job or that. The detractors are certainly hoping to derail the organisation from its mandate. But they will not win.”
In papers served and received by both the Attorney General and the DIS, World of Oath claims it was engaged before and after the elections to conduct “ongoing development of media intelligence gathering services” as well as “social media influencer tracking and gathering”.
The company says it was also engaged to conduct “reverse engineering media influence” and others.
The duo’s attorney, Tsholofelo Mvungama this week promised to find answers for Mmegi but could not deliver on his promise at the time of going to press. Through their lawyers, Lerumo Mogobe Legal Practitioners, World of Oath says it performed its duties, raised invoices, did not pressure for payment, but was met with threats when it began demanding settlement of the invoices.
“Recently when following up on payment on its invoices, you have now resorted to threatening and intimidating our client’s representatives to the point that they now fear for their lives with them having to constantly change their places of abode and checking their movements,” the lawyers wrote on Wednesday, in apparent reference to Magosi’s response to the demands.
“You have vowed to use the available government resources at your disposal to ‘teach’ them a lesson.”
The lawyers said the DIS gave World of Oath instructions around the elections “which can be reasonably and objectively categorised as having breached some of the provisions of the legislation regulating the DIS’ functions. They urged the DIS to cough up the P15 million within seven days of the letter of demand, failing which summons will be issued including interest claims and legal costs.