Whither Botswana?

DAN MOABI | Friday March 5, 2010 00:00

Last week I wrote, among other things, about how ironic it was that years after the enactment of the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime Act; and after parliament unanimously adopted a historic motion introduced by a member of the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP), which has been governing this country since 1965, the party's leadership was still strongly opposed to any suggestion that elected political leaders should be required to declare their assets and liabilities.

I found it even more ironic, I continued, that the BDP's leadership didn't 'seem aware of, nor even to care about, the potential damage that this is bound to cause to its integrity.' In retrospect, I realise that I should have just said: 'the damage that this is bound to cause to what remains of its integrity'.

There can't be much integrity left of a party in power that adopts landmark documents such as the DCEC Act and the motion on the declaration of assets and liabilities, and then spends the rest of its time in power actively undermining the important principles embodied in the two documents. The BDP must either live up to its own declared beliefs in democracy,accountability and transparency, or openly admit to the nation and to the rest of the world that it is, in fact, essentially no different from any of the undemocratic, corrupt and secretive governments that it often criticises so loudly. The party has deceived the nation and the rest of the world long enough; it's now time to come clean and tell us the real truth about itself. Its age-old deception is now rather hollow.

The disappointing story of the draft legislation that followed the historic motion of 1996 calling for the declaration of assets and liabilities by elected politicians is fairly well-known. For instance, there were lengthy arguments in parliament about the desirability of including in the proposed declarations the assets of spouses and children. But the strongest objections were made against the proposal to include the assets of paramours (or 'small houses' as they are popularly known today) in the declarations. The result of these and other objections was that the minister concerned was requested to amend the Bill and make it more palatable   to the objecting MPs. I can't remember how many times the Bill was considered by parliament and returned for different reasons.

But the last time that parliament discussed it was when Minister Phandu Skelemani announced that the government had decided to abandon the then 11-year-old Bill and introduce a code of conduct instead.

Given the chequered history of the old declaration of assets Bill, the BDP government's reaction to opposition MP Dumelang Saleshando's ongoing motion seeking parliament's permission to introduce a private members Bill similar to the one that the government rejected and abandoned only a few years ago was amazing.

The reaction came in the form of Minister Lesego Motsumi's request to parliament to reject Saleshando's motion as she herself intended to introduce a Bill similar to what Saleshando had in mind. I wondered how she could possibly do this. Could she be simply planning to dust the 14-year-old Bill down and return it to parliament? But I thought it was fairly clear by now that there couldn't possibly be even the slightest hope in hell of getting such a Bill through the cabinet. 

So the whole idea seemed rather far-fetched to me. But this was only until the straight-talking Vice President Mompati Merafhe [Remember his remark at the height of the national anger over the public execution of John Kalafatis at the hands of still-unidentified state security agents, and when he had just returned from receiving a democracy honour for Botswana in the US, that 'one or two shootings' weren't a big problem?] clarified in parliament that what Motsumi really meant was a Bill that would fully accommodate the concerns of the BDP leadership over such matters. 'It is going to be drafted according to our terms' Merafhe said (Mmegi, 02 March 2010). According to the paper, Merafhe also made it clear that he wouldn't support a Bill that would represent 'an intrusion into his privacy'.

Merafhe's latter comment typifies the BDP leadership's objection to suggestions that they should declare their assets for public scrutiny. Fortunately, Botswana National Front (BNF) MP, Abram Kesupile, was quick to say that contrary to Merafhe's views, the BNF regarded the proposed declaration of assets by elected politicians as an essential element of good governance in politics. The newspaper quoted Kesupile as having told Merafhe: 'It is the price you have to pay for being a public figure'.

Indeed, good governance and being public figures are among the main reasons for requiring elected politicians to declare their assets. Merafhe and his colleagues in government will not be able to convince the rest of us to observe the rules of good governance in our occupations if they themselves are seen not to do so in theirs. Nor can they convince us to abhor conflicts of interest and other forms of corruption when they themselves live under constant suspicion that they embrace them.