Cheap politicking divides villages
Ryder Gabathuse | Friday August 23, 2019 14:12
It’s becoming apparent that as political activity heightens here, especially between the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) and independent candidate, Prince Maele so does the level of differences in the two villages. Politicians are in a way determined to fight their political battles with anything at their disposal to ingratiate themselves with the masses.
They have been projecting an image of villages divided by petty political issues, which are personal in nature and not guided by any principle.
In that regard, villagers have been consuming divisive messages spewed from the freedom squares and kgotla meetings as politicians trade mind-blowing political salvos.
The two villages are connected by political demarcation that saw Lecheng/Malaka villages forming a ward in the constituency.
For sometime now, villagers have been at each other’s throats over many issues including very minute matters that could easily be resolved without hitches.
Last Saturday, Lerala/Maunatlala legislator Prince Maele could not contain his frustrations as he lashed out at BDP parliamentary hopeful in the constituency, Sethabelo Modukanele, the wife of Permanent Secretary to the President (PSP) Pini Morupisi who is also eyeing Lecheng/Malaka council seat and six others blaming them for forcing him out of the BDP.
He accused the duo (Modukanele and Morupisi) that hail from Malaka to be particularly divisive, petty and self-centred to the extent that they don’t want anything to do with him in the area.
Maele called his detractors, “pro-witches and wizards” who have forced him out of the BDP so that Modukanele could contest the parliamentary seat. He wanted them isolated and ignored at their Malaka village.
“Mongwe le mongwe yo o tla tlhophang batho ba, le ene ke moloi (Whoever votes for these people is also a witch),” thundered Maele who was visibly in his element.
He appealed to the Lecheng villagers not to vote for the Malaka-based politicians, but rather follow him and his team of councillors.
His hatred for the Morupisis was even more pronounced when he told his meeting that by extension a vote for council candidate Morupisi would mean, “empowering PSP Morupisi to continue abusing civil servants as he is the public servants enemy number one.”
Maele’s appeal against Modukanele and the Morupisis comes on the heels of former president Ian Khama’s blast of PSP Morupisi accusing him of abuse of office. Khama and Maele are close allies.
At a Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF) political rally in Palapye recently, former president and patron of the BPF, Khama accused PSP Morupisi to have used his office to force the Central District Council (CDC) to take the culvert project to his village just because he is the PSP.
Khama had claimed that he was informed by Lecheng/Malaka councillor, Charles Mabjweng, who himself hails from Lecheng.
The gist of Khama’s message was that Morupisi and his people were using office powers to take developments to Malaka and thus disadvantaging Lecheng.
Morupisi recently dismissed ‘s accusations as hogwash and baseless before referring enquiries on the matter to the Palapye Administrative Authority (PAA) senior assistant council secretary (SACS), Lucky Maoto.
BDP parliamentary candidate for Lerala/Maunatlala Modukanele does not see any divisions between Lecheng/Malaka, rather he chooses to blame Maele for being a divisive character that is regretting his recalling by the BDP leadership. Modukanele concurs that there are very few people in the Lerala/Maunatlala constituency who particularly want to divide Lecheng/Malaka villages but will fail since they are known.
In is view, Maele was simply running out of ideas to be calling people all sorts of names instead of informing them what he would do if elected as an independent candidate.
He challenged Maele to pause and reflect heavily on what he was going to do for the people instead of ‘insulting us.”
He said just like his symbol of Thaba or hill emphasises, he has a mountain to climb in the constituency that is pro-BDP. He reminded his former party colleague about his 10 years of deficit in terms of serving his people.
“Maele should pursue issue-based politics instead of dividing us and portraying Malaka residents as troublemakers and pulling us away from Lecheng,” Modukanele said this week indicating that what his opposite number was peddling was simply cheap politics devoid of substance.
He added: “Modukanele and Morupisi are not the problems of the constituency and for a seasoned politician who is not worth his salt, does not deserve the favour of the constituents at all. He should come to his senses and stop imagining things that are non-existent.”
Morupisi, who is vying for the Lecheng/Malaka council seat was not bothered much by freedom square issues dismissing Maele’s accusations as devoid of substance at all.
“That’s pure propaganda and worse, he has chosen to call us witches and all that.
This is the same man who a few months ago was a BDP MP and we were his trusted allies and today we are witches and divisive,” wondered Morupisi describing Maele’s accusations as the last kicks of a dying horse.