The Universal Health Service Which Never Happened
Sandy Grant | Wednesday October 26, 2016 18:03
Intrigued, I asked in the Monitor of the 12th for more information about four of these facts and in respect of the Bangwaketse initiative asked, how the scheme was financed, how it was administered and what kinds of health services were included? In Mmegi of, I think, the 18th which I picked up from the internet, Ramsay helpfully replied in an article headlined, ‘Yes, Merriweather and Bathoen II delivered health for all’. I quote. ‘The service began when the then Regent Ntebogang (1924-28) supported the Seven Day Adventist (SDA, Sabata) church in establishing a medical mission in Kanye, which was expanded under her successor Kgosi Bathoen II.
In this context, as Isaac Schapera observed in his book “Tribal Innovators” (Athlone, 1970): “In 1929 the Seventh Day Adventist medical mission agreed with Bathoen II that in return for a monthly subsidy (of 50 pounds sterling) it would supply the people with free medicines and treatment. To meet the cost, Bathoen imposed a tribal levy of 2s (shillings) per taxpayer. Some of his people objected.” A quick check with “Tribal Innovators” showed that there was an additional sentence which Ramsay had omitted.
I quote. ‘The matter was reported to the Resident Commissioner who ordered the levy to be abandoned, mainly because the Mission was already receiving a government grant for its medical work in the tribe.’ Unquote. In other words, the tribe would have gained from the proposed levy nothing more than it was already receiving.
But if there still remains any misunderstanding about the fate of the proposed levy, it should be noted that the subject was included in a small section in which Schapera provided four examples of Chiefly initiatives, Bathoen’s being one, which were aborted by the British Administration. Ramsay, however, had provided additional information to buttress his claims for the levy and the universal health service that was never implemented. He stated, ‘as this author, among others, has also noted, e.g. in “The Birth of Botswana, A History of the Bechuanaland Protectorate 1910-66” (Longman, 1987), the imposition of the said levy was not without controversy, its rejection by the Bakgatla baga Mmanaana at Moshupa in particular giving rise to conflict. But if there never was a levy, why were the people of Moshupa so upset about it, as Ramsay suggests?
His supporting authority, ‘The Birth of Botswana’ (p22) merely states, however, ‘that only in Mosopa did the SDA remain unwelcome’ which suggests that feelings there related to the SDA’s newly-established medical mission in Kanye and had nothing whatsoever to do with Bathoen’s cancelled levy. Why one major authority would subvert the statements of another major authority is a mystery, but whatever the reason, it is important to note that the Bangwaketse did not, as claimed, pioneer the creation of a universal health service, either then or later.