Military Intelligence � An arm of the ruling party

Richard Moleofe | Friday March 10, 2017 15:43

The question is, if there are so many gaps in the way MI functions as a critical subset of our military, what has been occupying our MI and what steps are necessary to offset this imbalance.

I must say right at the beginning that BDF is by far a professional military institution by African standards and that of the rest of the developed world. This level of professionalism came to light during our debut peacekeeping mission in Somalia and subsequent others in places like Rwanda and Mozambique. BDF’s enviable professionalism emanates from our long standing cooperation with the American government on military matters through the IMET (International Military Exchange and Training).

Furthermore, BDF has always excelled at international military competitions. A good example here would be Airborne Africa which is a Special Forces an annual competition held only in Africa. BDF has consistently maintained a top ten position and even achieving position three when the competition was held in Maun in 2003. This event has attracted the UK’s SAS, India, USA, Brazil and many others.

One of the toughest jobs for any Commander at BDF now and in future is to bring back MI back to the barracks and thus divorcing it from working for the ruling party. It is a sensitive issue for any General who wants to keep his job because you don’t have to mess up with Dom-Krag.

Intelligence work is sensitive by nature and I would be bordering on the margins of stupidity if I don’t regard MI secrets as so particularly that I am an ex-soldier. Even as a liberal writer, I am mindful of the fact that intelligence must be given the space it deserves to practice what they are there for. But in this piece I would like to highlight to the reader how this arm of our dear defence force has been involved in other activities either than MI work. Something that Professor Michael Parentti calls dirty tricks in politics.

In 1996 I was tasked with the work of counselling a group of young soldiers at BDF after a failed MI political operation. These counselling sessions came on the heels of a BNF Congress which was held at Ledumang Senior Secondary School in that same year. An intelligence team that was tasked with infiltrating this political party was exposed at this meeting.

Their team leader was in hot waters as he was blamed by his bosses for the failed mission. Pressure was mounted on the team leader to an extent where he contemplated suicide and that is when I was given the opportunity to counsel on him as I am specialised in suicide prevention.

This became one of the most difficult moments in my career because I was dealing with a victim who was in this case the accused. As part of the ethical practice in counselling, I am not at liberty to reveal the client’s names and those of his team members that I had a chance to interview in order to get to the root of the problem. With his consent I will be able to publish the name in my autobiography a few years down the line.

It was in these counselling sessions that I started developing goose bumps as matters were revealed to me. As a professional counsellor and especially one dealing largely with male issues, the first thing I had always said to my clients is that; they should speak the truth and the truth would set them free.For me this was an ice breaker that helped me deal with breaking the barriers of the male ego.

More men commit suicide and the underlying reason points to the macho man within whom the male ego resides. Getting a soldier or any other man loosen up and overcome this is critical victory in the life of any counsellor and on the march to overcoming the underlying problem at hand. And for me as a counsellor, I never dealt with any one problem in isolation of other factors. So I had to pull in other strings.

After greasing the MI team leader, he was in a fair position to cooperate with me as his counsellor and from there on I was completely in control of all other subsequent counselling sessions. The fellow was transferred to work in Maun with immediate effect and this literally brought him tears every time he considered that his masters have abandoned him. Indeed he spoke the truth and the truth set him free.

I and Brigadier Scheffers, a man who would have served this country better as a human rights lawyer had always spoken against transfers with immediate effect because it showed that commanders at subordinate levels were disregarding planning and hence causing so much pain and suffering to the families of soldiers who were affected by such abrupt transfers.

As both of us were in the BDF’s “Polit Bureau” we had been pushing for transfers to resonate with the school holidays in order to allow the smooth transfer of children from one school to another. The man in question had clearly pointed to me during our sessions that he was being persecuted for the reason that his team’s cover had been exposed at the afore mentioned political congress.

Members of his team had supported his statement and I was able to talk him down from his suicidal tendencies. I was done with hurdle one which was by all measure the most difficult and I had to deal with reversing the transfer to Maun. What was sad about the transfer was that the man was now going to work as a cook in the kitchen, a job far removed from his training as a spy. I felt so much pity for the fellow because spies hate labouring and sweating.

They are just used to working with pen and paper and the heaviest tool they would carry is an SLR camera accompanied by recording devices; that’s all! The next morning I knocked at the door of his new boss, a respected Lieutenant Colonel from the old era. He clearly pointed out to me that he had no idea why this MI agent was transferred to his unit and expressed how difficult it was going to be in employing his skills in the kitchen.

I proceeded to the Commander’s office after a useless meeting with the then Director of Defence Personnel (DDP) who wanted to throw me from pillar to post until the victim was transferred to Maun. The Commander acceded to my request on the “stay of execution” and we struck a deal that the fellow would remain at SSKB until the day he retired albeit at the kitchen. After all this, the political damage was achieved. The all powerful Botswana National Front succumbed to the viral infiltration and was bitterly split into two in 1998.