Independent Candidate Vows To Topple Guma
Lebogang Mosikare | Monday January 14, 2019 13:05
But lo and behold, Tshwenyego Mbise, the former campaign aide of Tati East Member of Parliament (MP), Samson Moyo Guma is challenging his former colleague for the coveted position of the area MP during this year’s general elections. Surprisingly, Mbise was not one of the aspiring candidates who challenged Guma during the BDP’s primary elections last year.
Asked by The Monitor what has now changed, which aroused his interest to challenge Guma, Mbise responded: “Guma has poor leadership qualities and lacks manners. He also failed to address a lot of pertinent issues that are affecting people in our constituency”.
Quizzed to clarify his statement that Guma lacks manners, Mbise alleged: “During one meeting that was addressed by former president Ian Khama at Themashanga Kgotla, Guma boldly told Khama, despite many complaints people were raising about him that he does not care because he knows that when he slaughters cattle in the run up to elections, the very same people who were complaining about him will forget about the complaints and continue voting him”.
“Guma’s words have left a bitter taste in the mouths of voters in the whole constituency. They have vowed to punish him at the ballot just to show him that he belittled and disrespected them,” Mbise continued. “The people are the ones who told me to stand against Guma and have promised me their votes. In fact, Guma did not utter those words only in Themashanga, but said them in other areas in the constituency. He surely does not deserve to be called an Honourable Member of Parliament.” In the political history of Botswana, only Nehemiah Modubule has managed to enter Parliament as an independent candidate.
Quizzed if it would not to be a tall order to emulate Modubule, Mbise said: “I trust the people of this constituency and I am sure they would not renege on their promise. I am going to do miracles and emulate what Modubule had achieved. To put it in plain language, the people are fed up with Guma’s behaviour. Guma is forgetting that people now are getting enlightened about politics. Even elders who used to vote for Guma religiously are annoyed with his mannerisms”.
Mbise stated that his fallout with Guma started at the Mmadinare congress where President Mokgweetsi Masisi was voted as chairperson of the BDP.
Mbise said Guma wanted him to vote for Masisi while he wanted to vote for someone else. The aspiring MP clarified that he did not want to challenge Guma during the BDP’s primary elections because he did not want to split votes.
“Guma was standing against a very competent and quality politician in Sean Sebele. Guma did not win the primary elections by margins of thousands like he used to do in the past. This on its own should teach Guma that the people are going to punish him at the polls during the general elections”.
In response to Mbise comments, Guma said as a Motswana, Mbise has a democratic and constitutional right of standing for any position during the elections.
“Mbise is very much welcome to contest against me. I have no qualms about that. But he should not forget that during the general elections, the BDP’s name would be written on the ballot papers and not my name like during the primary elections. He should also not forget that he would also be competing against the opposition. He should therefore not channel all his energies in a quest to topple me, but he should also strategise about how he would defeat the opposition,” Guma said.
“I advise Mbise to come up with a manifesto and tell people what he would do once he is elected to Parliament although his wish is just like building a castle in the sky. The BDP will come with a manifesto and sell it to the people. My job will be just to sell that manifesto to the people”. On a lighter note, Guma joked that Mbise would defeat him in a beauty contest and not in a political contest because he (Mbise) is a mere political lightweight.