Bulgasa has always had an ideology

| Monday October 11, 2010 00:00

The gist of the story is to tell how the man had a hard childhood and how it cultivated within him a passion for protecting the down trodden from exploiters.

Baeng's childhood experiences are of no interest in this article. What one finds disturbing is that he should claim that when he became president of Botswana Unified Local Government Service Association (BULGSA) in 2004, he found the Association without an ideology that guided its actions and that he then gave it the 'working class ideology'.

BULGSA was founded in 1974 at the Trade Union Centre in the African Mall. It was founded to advocate for the improvement of the workplace welfare of permanent and pensionable employees of the local authorities; so the very foundation of the Association was rooted on an ideology that believes that workers cannot allow themselves to be exploited without fighting for their own rights. This point then casts doubt on Baeng's understanding of what an ideology is. But before providing a definition of an ideology lets move a little further with the history of BULGSA.

The Association had a number of noteworthy leaders such as the late Chapson Jabulani Butale who later became a parliamentarian and cabinet minister and Edmond Moabi, a disciplinarian and focused hard worker who constantly reminded the employer of its debt to the employee. There was also Pius Mokgwathi, the revolutionary who mobilised Association members around their issues and created a militant membership and victories were won under his leadership. This is the man who put up his house for sale so that the Association could afford court costs in a legal battle with government.

And then there was Gabatsoswe  Lere Lebitsa who led the great strike of 2002; in which workers in the local Authorities countrywide were mobilised in an industrial action that paralysed the country and caused government to address the demands of the workers; a man who under his leadership BULGSA Vision 2004 was fashioned, a document that informed the current achievements in BLLAHWU (a fact that Baeng himself admitted in a recent regional meeting in Palapye) including the plot on which the Association offices stand and the very struggle to unionise public sector Associations. And now Baeng wants to make the nation believe that all these men acted in the manner they did within an Association that 'did not have an ideological philosophy.' Implying that they themselves were without ideology. 

He claims to have given the union 'a working class ideology.' But then BULGSA adopted the working class ideology document during the 2003 Annual General Conference held in Shoshong under the theme: BULGSA Setting an Agenda for Workers - A painful undertaking.

The then president of the Association was David Kanje. Kanje did not give the Association its ideology, it always had an ideology, but the production of the working class ideology document was an effort of several structures of the Association. The idea of a document of the working class ideology came out of a presentation made by Taolo Lucas in a workshop organised by Gaborone Branch, seeking among other things, to establish a foundation for a formal ideology for the Association to be proposed for adoption at the next Annual General Conference.

If anything, Baeng took away the working class ideology from local authorities' workers. For one it was during his tenure that the union abandoned its struggle to set an agenda for workers through unifying the working class by fostering and sustaining unity in the unions which are the only formal structures of the working class. Instead, the man has aligned himself with neo liberal forces which have taken over the trade union movement and have torn it into two opposing federations and are busy using the unions to amass personal wealth and power.The BLLAHWU outgoing president has been in the forefront of efforts to keep Trainers and Allied Workers Union (TAWU) and Botswana Government Workers Union (BOGOWU) out of the Public Service Bargaining Council in spite of the fact that the unions are recognised by the employer and that they have memberships which are entitled to representation in the bargaining council. And in an absurd move recently, BLLAHWU and its gang, BTU, BOSETU, BOPEU and Manual Workers Union actually called a strike to block the entry of other trade unions into the bargaining council, in total disregard of solidarity among workers which is one of the core principles of the working class ideology.It is this man who has clearly acted contrary to the working class interests, who now wants to be portrayed as the man who delivered BULGSA from darkness. 

Now, back to the definition of an ideology; an ideology can be defined as a set of ideas and beliefs that can be used to understand phenomenon and guide action. It is hoped that Baeng will benefit from this definition and perhaps begin to subscribe to the 'ideology of truth.' It will probably be profitable for him to also note that 'One problem is that ideological consensus can be mistaken for an absence of ideology.' Allan R. Ball & B. Guy Peters (2005, p.305).

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