BLLAHWU Splits
Tsaone Basimanebotlhe | Monday July 4, 2016 16:38
This will be the second split in BLLAHWU since 2012, when the nurses decided to form the BONU (the Botswana Nurses Union).
The Monitor has it in good authority that some disgruntled members led by former president Motelebane Motelebane are said to be in the final stages of registering a splinter, and the name Progressive Workers Union (PWU) has already been submitted to the Registrar of Societies. The name was submitted last week Monday and awaits to be gazetted after approval.
The core team behind the formation of the union met a fortnight ago in Palapye to discuss the logistics and how their union will operate.
The new union is also targeting the same clientele with BLLAHWUand that is likely going to reduce the membership of BLLAHWU.
The Monitor has learnt that the new union is sponsored by some executive members of BLLAHWU burial society, known as BBS.
BLLAHWU and its burial society came to loggerheads after some members accused union central executive committee (CEC) of interference.
The society is said to have told union leadership that it was an independent entity duly registered under the Societies Act and run by a democratically elected management committee. Sources within the union revealed that the ongoing battle between the society and the union executive led to entrenching factions that had already been in existence.
“The new union is led by the factional team that had long been there in BLLAHWU. This is not surprising to BLLAHWU because it has long seen this thing coming. The union needs to introspect as it might affect it badly.
I believe it should make some of things transparent to avoid this split. There is still a room for negotiations between the two parties,” the source said. Another insider revealed that the union executive wanted to take control of the society because it said some congress of the Union had resolved that it should do so.
“Therefore, BBS management committee felt duty bound to tell CEC that it was the only committee constitutionally mandated to run the Society through decisions made by its annual general meetings.”
Some accuse union of no longer representing their interests, but those of political parties.
“The leadership has turned the union into their personal property and is unable to account for its finances given that the CEC has failed to present audited books at several congresses,” the source said.
While the establishment of the new union is already at an advanced stage, the BLLAHWU secretary general Ketlhalefile Motshegwa however claims ignorance of the fact.
“I have not been in the country and I am not aware that some of our members are forming their own union,” Motshegwa said.
Efforts to get comment from Motelebane were unsuccessful, as his phones were not going through, while another of the alleged leaders of the new formation, Gerald Mahumba denied that they had formed a union.
BLLAHWU burial society chairperson Tebogo Moalosi also denied that some of their executive members are funding the disgruntled members.“We are not even aware that some members are breaking up from BLLAHWU to form their union. Our duty is to focus on burials not what happens at union,” Moalosi said.