BMD's is a mere scorpion sting - Garekwe

LEKOPANYE MOOKETSI
Correspondent | Tuesday July 27, 2010 00:00

 

According to a BDP official, the ruling party considers the Botswana National Front (BNF) as a more serious threat than the BMD.

Since Parliament resumed earlier this month, the BDP lost two more legislators to the BMD, namely, Shoshong MP Phillip Makgalemele and Mogoditshane MP Patrick Masimolole. This is in an addition to the four MPs expelled from the BDP earlier.  

The BMD says it still expects more legislators to decamp from the BDP.

Botswana's erstwhile independent MP, Nehemiah Modubule, also joined the BMD last week.  The new force on the country's political scene, the BMD has been making unprecedented inroads into the membership of the BDP since its inception last April.

Barely two months old, the BMD has seven seats in Parliament from an initial four to become the official opposition almost overnight. All seven seats were held by erstwhile members of the BDP who have been defecting in an unparalleled seismic wave.

But BDP publicity chief, Segaetsho Garekwe, insists that even with the latest defections, the BMD is still not a threat to the ruling party.

Garekwe says they will treat the newly formed BMD like any other political party and that there is no need to panic. On the other hand, he says, they consider the BNF to be more serious than the BMD.

'We want to assure Batswana that there is no need to press panic buttons,' says Garekwe. 'The people are with us. As long as we are with the people, we are happy. We are still getting stronger.'

The BDP spokesman says defections to the BMD have not shaken the BDP and draws the analogy of the difference between the stings of a scorpion and a black mamba.

Pressed further, Garekwe makes the begrudging confession that they get concerned when their members defect to another party because the ambition of every party is to retain all its members.

'But to be concerned does not mean that we are losing the war,' he says, adding that the BDP will this week brief the media on its next strategy.

Contrary to their claims, some of the MPs who have defected to the BMD have not taken BDP structures with them but left alone, or with one or two sidekicks, Garekwe says.

The BDP spokesman claims the defection of the MP for Shoshong, Philip Makgalemele, was not approved by local BDP councillors. The same goes for the Tonota South MP, Samson Guma-Moyo.

Only one BDP official has defected to the BMD in Molepolole North. Garekwe says at any rate, some of the MPs who have left the BDP will not be 'mourned' because they did not want to be disciplined.

As for the MP for Mogoditshane, Patrick Masimolole, no reasons were given for his resignation from the BDP. 'We never had any problem with him,' Garekwe says. He repeats BDP leader Ian Khama's trite dismissal that the defectors are power hungry and are seeking positions at the new party.

The BDP spokesman says members of the BMD are committing a serious blunder that they will regret for the rest of their political lives because people will punish them at the polls in 2014.

Garekwe does not think that there are any more BDP MPs who will cross the floor. However, the BMD says to wait and see.