DPP office should stop trying so hard to please politicians

Kgosietsile Ngakaagae | Friday November 22, 2019 11:48

Knowing the shenanigans of UDC “cooler box boys”, I knew they were capable of such a stunt. For those who have signed non-aggression pacts with your computers, the first lady’s picture was put side by side, on social media, with that of an “ugly” lady and captioned, “go masisinyana”.

Now, the First Lady is not ugly at all. I don’t think the President made a bad decision if what he was looking for was a pretty lady. As such, the comparison was of no moment to me. After all, there are beautiful women I wouldn’t touch with a long pole. But because she isn’t ugly, she didn’t really have to be bothered. So I wondered who, precisely, was bothered on her behalf. As a defence lawyer, I would have insisted on Mrs Masisi being called to the witness stand and would have had loads of fun.

Look, I am one person who has been called ugly so many times I have lost count. In the run up to the elections, a small section of UDC lady supporters, some of who looked very much like the lady pictured next to Neo Masisi, used to taunt me for my supposed ugliness even though I look better than them and their horrendously ugly boyfriends.

Many BDP and AP women didn’t share that opinion anyway. Besides, some beautiful UDC women would inbox me to say how good I looked. Now, I don’t think I look good but I’d be really flattered. So why did I have to bother about “cooler box girls”? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

I can recall a time when a man was arrested for likening the image of the former President to that of a “Mosarwa”. I have the word in quotes because I know it can be quite offensive and I apologise in advance. Until this hoax came about, I had yet to come across a more ridiculous reason for an arrest. Firstly, Basarwa women look really good. They are really wonderful people. Secondly, I am told they are better in bed and don’t have to use donkey milk like their overrated, tribalistic counterparts.

Thirdly, I am told `they have the best traditional doctors, and that were it not for their magical cures for impotence, the Tswana family unit would have long vanished. Moreover, they have all the attributes that commend the human soul to heaven which we thieving and greedy tribes don’t have.

I mean, they are the only tribe that smiles genuinely. I wondered why, in any case, a person would take offence at being compared to a fellow human being. Whoever made the comparison would have made it out of tribalistic motives. Whoever took offence would have been a tribalist too. The prosecutorial office that indicted would itself have been criminally tribalistic. In life there are instances best ignored.

Cases of national importance must go through a fine, prosecutorial filter. I remember seeing, many years ago, a list the Attorney General had written to the DPP, stating categories of cases considered by her to be of nation importance as envisaged by Section 51(6)(b) o the Constitution. I cannot recall if the same list included cases in which the First Lady was concerned but I would have expected that every charge sheet that concerned the first family would receive the DPP’s attention anyway. There are reasons for so saying.

Firstly, there are excitable characters in our law enforcement units who cant wait to star on a court movie involving the first family. Armed with very little understanding of the Cybercrime and

Computer Related Crimes Act and its interrelationship with other constitutional guarantees, this variety would excitedly rush to court so as to grab the headlines. Sadly, we have a lot of such characters at the DPP office, at present. They are even prepared to lie, to fabricate evidence and to draft stupid charge sheets just to be seen to be acting in consonance with prevailing political views.

They think it is their duty to help President Masisi against former President Khama. Just imagine the characters who charged Khama’s bodyguards with the possession of paintballs. I mean, those were paintballs; literally. They only needed to ask a police special constable what a real gun looked like before striking out to court.

Imagine the ones who say that my beautiful Butterfly stole a P100bn that we never had. How silly? To be sure, theft has happened, and Bank of Botswana are not all clean. Forget their nonsensical denials. Money was looted from them under the guise of DIS operations and they allowed it. But the P100bn story is certainly a load of tripe.

Some cases, if not properly screened, can give credence to conclusions that the prosecutorial and law enforcement agencies are merely appendages of the Office of the President and have become irredeemably politicised. They can dent public confidence in those all-important institutions and in the Presidency. Regrettably, the DCEC and DPP departments may just as well be allocated seats in parliament. Either they are sycophantically trying too hard to please the President or are acting under grave dictation. In the process they making a complete mess of themselves.