Stalemate at BMD after violent weekend
Staff Writer | Thursday July 20, 2017 18:00
Yesterday, political analyst Leonard Sesa told Mmegi that the reluctance was most likely because both camps “know they are somehow wrong”.
“The parties could have gotten an independent party to reconcile them and run the congress for them. As it stands it is a difficult situation, which will not see any of the parties rush to court, as they both know they are somehow at fault,” he said.
Both camps took to the media yesterday, with the Ndaba Gaolathe faction addressing a press conference, while new BMD leader, Sydney Pilane took to a local radio station to air his views. Wynter Mmolotsi, the acting president of the Gaolathe camp, said the faction would not rush to the courts, but would wait for Pilane to “come to his senses”.
“Pilane was elected in an illegal gathering and he should know he can never be a president. “Our congress was only short of the chairperson in terms of what the constitution requires for a congress to be held. So since he absconded his duty to be with thugs, we had to elect someone to preside,” he told journalists.
The Pilane camp yesterday released a statement through its secretary general, Gilbert Mangole, saying action, legal or otherwise, would be taken against “any person, group or body who may claim to have held a congress or claim to have been elected into any position in that congress, which congress is purported to have been held as the BMD congress”.
Mangole later told Mmegi that the camp was still consulting on whether to approach the courts or not. In Bobonong on Saturday, an uncompromising Pilane said members of the Gaolathe camp should go and form another party to prove they had numbers behind them.
“They do not have the numbers they claim to have. At least 37 constituencies were represented at Matshekge School and the majority of those who attended the congress at Bobonong Secondary School were not BMD members,” he said.
But his rival, Mmolotsi told journalists: “At Bobonong Junior School, we had 47 constituencies, 12 regions, six members of Parliament, 31 councillors, the women’s league, youth league and party elders.”
In the afternoon in Parliament, Defence, Justice and Security Shaw Kgathi expressed “regret and disappointment” at the violent “incidents and destruction of government and private property,” in Bobonong.
“The residents of Bobonong were traumatised by the incident over the weekend,” he told legislators. The BMD leadership owes Batswana, families of all those who sustained injuries and the people of Bobonong in particular an apology. What transpired over the weekend has the potential to degenerate this country into a state of anarchy and political hooliganism that we have witnessed elsewhere in the world,” Kgathi said.
The Bobonong legislator said the Ministry of Basic Education was yet to make an assessment of the cost of damage at Matshekge Senior Secondary School.
Meanwhile, the Botswana National Front (BNF) has taken a resolution that the Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC) national executive committee should deal with the BMD issue.
The party reached the resolution during its weekend congress held in Kang, after members raised concern about the state of affairs at BMD. BNF chairperson, Abigail Mogalakwe challenged the party to take a stand regarding the matter, saying it would soon affect UDC.
The UDC constitution gives power to the national congress or the National Executive Committee to suspend or expel a group member if it believes that it is acting against the interests of the umbrella.