Kgoroba unyielding on AP, despite meeting flop
Innocent Selatlhwa | Tuesday October 24, 2017 16:01
In 2014, Kgoroba won the delicately balanced constituency by a small margin of 334, with Tumiso Rakgare of the Botswana Congress Party (BCP) coming second with 3,846 votes, followed closely by Patrick Masimolole of the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) with 3,787.
Over the weekend, Kgoroba called a meeting to update potential AP members about the new party’s progress. The meeting was the first in the constituency and was expected to measure support for the about to be launched opposition party. However, only a handful of people turned up, reminding Kgoroba that his defection could cost him re-election. The BCP is now an Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC) member and is widely expected to strongly challenge for the constituency in 2019.
Despite the poor attendance, Kgoroba maintained that he was prepared to lose his seat “fighting what is right”. The MP said he was fighting for “righteousness and truth”.
“We were voted in through the UDC and people have been saying we will lose elections without the UDC. I would love to win elections and serve people, but I will not put my political future ahead of righteousness. We want to lead with people who are doing what is right,” he said.
Kgoroba said the AP had not ruled out the possibility of working with the UDC. He however said they would never work with the BMD leadership, singling out Sidney Pilane, Nehemiah Modubule and Gilbert Mangole.
“The reason we left the BMD was because we could not work together anymore. We will not just jump into UDC. We have to interrogate if they are the same principled party we contested under in 2014. We also expect them to interrogate us as Progressives to see if they can work with us,” he said.
The legislator called on Batswana to shun Pilane and his team, accusing them of “undermining democracy”.
“Democracy should not only be demanded of the ruling party only. Opposition parties should also be held to account,” he said.