The unending battle of slander

LAWRENCE OOKEDITSE | Friday January 21, 2011 00:00

A caption 'Kadugli is surrounded by scared villagers who have survived mass killings and forced relocation.' To the left of this picture is the inscription 'Survival,' an emblem with two palms reaching out in a manner that suggests a longing to be saved. Underneath this is an inscription 'The movement for tribal peoples'.

But the above is all dwarfed by a bigger picture of Roy Sesana wielding the tail of a dancing beast. A caption to this picture reads: 'DON'T LET THE GREAT DANCE END. Give now to help the Kalahari Bushmen win the right to water.' Further to the right is the latest news from around the world.

The first headline reads: 'Bushmen back in court over water rights.' The second one: 'Botswana approves $3bn mine as Bushman water case gets underway.'  The third one and the only one not on Botswana reads: 'Brazilian authorities approve Amazon dam despite presence of uncontacted Indians.' The fourth: 'Bushmen 'determined' as legal battle over water approaches climax.'

Below the picture of Sesana dancing is a further attraction. What stands out most is the sketch of a diamond accompanied by the words: 'BOYCOTT BOTSWANA DIAMONDS.'  Next to this is a picture of a black African with the caption: 'Racism kills tribal people. Stamp it out.'

Finally, there is a poster of a white woman, I suspect an aborigine from Australia or one of the so-called 'Red Indian' tribes with a malnourished child. The caption to this one is: 'Progress can kill.' I have never been to war, but I have seen many wars on television. I have also studied war. Going through this page, one feels the tension of a war zone. A cold war of some sort as it turns out that Batswana are barred from posting pictures on the SI home page.

Late last year, President Khama threw in his own word. 'It is only our misguided detractor Survival International who would like to see all the socio-economic benefits from diamonds for all our citizens reversed by embarking upon a campaign of lies and misinformation that seeks to achieve for a section of our population, a life of backwardness that appeals to their racist mentality of having people in Africa live a primitive life of deprivation co-existing alongside wild animals as was the case in the past,' he said.

Justifying the relocations, the President further argued: 'No Motswana should exist as a tourist project to satisfy the desires of a few misguided foreigners living relatively well off with all the benefits they enjoy in a developed economy, while wanting to satisfy their fantasies by trying to influence some of our people to live a primeval life of a bygone era of hardship and indignity ... Recent results make me confident that we will soon find a solution and that is why their campaign has been stepped up because when we resolve this, their source of funding will be dried up. I'm saying when we find the solution, and not if we find it.'

President Khama further argued that Survival cares very little about people but use these campaigns to appeal to donors' emotions so that they may benefit from funding. Perhaps true, but not completely. 'Survival International are nothing more than modern-day highway robbers, demanding 'Your money or your life.'

This is how Survival International survives,' was President Khama's conclusion. I wish he had pronounced a strategy towards closing this issue. We need that terribly. But it is not his war to fight alone. In a different tone, Mmereki, a socialist publication, cited the Botswana Movement for Democracy (BMD) saying they would support Survival International if their reasons are valid.

The editors think this position is remarkable, for it is the first time an opposition party openly and clearly demands respect for the basic rights of Basarwa in the CKGR. They say the BCP and the BNF quickly seconded the views of the BMD. What a catalyst the BMD is!

Mmereki clearly spells out its desire for opposition unity to be built around the CKGR issue as the basis of demands for human rights for all Batswana. So already I hear murmurs of they are not objective as they are clearly opposition. Maybe their argument that the BMD is first is not completely true since back in 2004, Mmegi reported that the BNF Youth League had met with Stephen Corry of Survival International.

'Confirming the meeting, Kanjabanga said his organisation agrees completely with SI in respect of the long-standing human rights violations against the Basarwa so much that the issue of Basarwa and the rights of minorities in general will become a major issue in the forthcoming general elections.' Gabriel Kanjabanga was Youth League President at the time. But I admire Mmereki for its openness about its intentions and advocacy.

The Botswana Democratic Party page paraphrases what they say is a recent interview on a local radio station with Duma Boko: 'Paraphrase from his interview at a local radio station: the only way to teach the BPD a lesson and force them to listen is to support Survival International in their campaign against Botswana diamonds and tourism...why should all Batswana be punished because Boko does not like the BDP, or is he speaking for the BNF?'

In response to this posting, somebody wrote: 'Batswana are selling their souls to a hate group and personally am disgusted.' The more virulent argue that others should be more 'patriotic and less idiotic'. All these point to a nation without a coherent strategy to deal with both the issue at hand (the relocation of Basarwa) and Survival International's advocacy and tactics.

Boko was not commenting on this issue for the first time in that radio interview. In his 'Message to the People' late last year, he argued: 'We must state and emphasise that as the government persists in its gushing torrent of anti-poverty talk, the Basarwa of the CKGR are still denied the fundamental right to water!

Their muted pleas and desperate cries for help have not attracted even a tincture of compassion from the government and its High Court.' Touching on the international nature of the issue, Boko argued: 'The cries have been amplified and projected onto the world stage by Survival International.

These cries were chronicled with precision and analysed in a most rigorous scholarly fashion by Professor James Anaya, the UN Rapporteur on Indigenous Peoples' Rights sent to investigate the matter.'  He ended his argument by calling on the government 'to redeem itself and repair its tattered international image' as 'the situation of the CKGR is a culmination of BDP policies begun many years ago, enforced with sadistic brutality by former President Mogae, and continued without demure by the current President. The problem is not Survival International. The problem is the BDP and the callousness of its government!'

I see a nation at loggerheads on this issue. Even public debate does not clearly show whether there is a national consensus. This is saddening for a number of reasons: that Botswana has perhaps not had meaningful a national debate on an issue that could cripple life as we know it for the majority of Batswana; on an issue that certainly has consequences for a section of Botswana society and on an issue that will certainly have an impact on Botswana's image internationally. Macdonald Peloetletse's Facebook posting and the many responses to it is what got me curious to write about this.

'If the Gem Diamond mining was to be carried out in Gope - CKGR, the mining will only affect the 20 residents of Gope. Other settlements are nowhere near Gope settlement. Metsiamonong is over 70 km from Gope. Molapo 120 km from Gope. Gugamma 150 km from Gope. Kikao 190 km from Gope. Xade over 200 km.

So why is SI using the Gope Gem Diamond mining in their campaign?' He also posted: 'Jumanda Gakelebone is a damn CRIMINAL, LIAR, Manipulator and Satanic. He claims there are '600' Basarwa currently living in the CKGR!

Utter RUBBISH. Basarwa in the CKGR are less than 60. This is the total number of residents at all five settlements.' In response to Peloetletse's postings, another person writes: 'MacDonald, if there is one angry person it is you, a denial pretentious fellow is yourself, you are the one exposing yourself for the true colours you are, in fact i urge the masses to follow the typos of your wall to get a true image. e dreamer and surely filled with pride in your fantacy. You could ruin the image of the party if you were the Secretary General or anything in the Executive.

Swallow your frastration, le gompieno ke a go tlhobosa, batho ba ba tshwanang le wena dont get the dynamics of us masses in the ground, you think Domi belongs to you alone, u r so wrong, REFORM AND SWALLOW YOUR FRASTRATION..'. At that Macdonald requests the person who posted that to stop personal attacks on him.

On another Facebook group page, Botswana Information, the administrator has posted this: 'Botswana's government has green-lighted a massive $3bn mine in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve - in the middle of the Kalahari Bushmen's appeal against the Botswana authorities' refusal to allow them access to water there.' The posting then ignites debate by arguing that 'Survival and the Bushmen have always maintained that the Bushmen were evicted to make way for diamond mining.

The government long denied this, claiming the diamond deposit at Gope was 'sub-economic'. It ends: 'we can't wait to hear your take on this one at our wall. The debates are not coordinated. But Botswana continues to get a battering abroad as some report early this year suggested that about 19,900 people had signed up to boycott Wilderness Safaris for opening a lodge in the CKGR.

An Indonesian fellow at the World Universities Debating Championships also had a long chat with me and others about the Basarwa. His views pointed to the fact that internationally, a lot of people are still not well informed.

This is a war. Sadly, we are at a war without a united nation behind the war effort or a General at the forefront specifically for this battle. Is it perhaps time to establish some Special Envoy/Rapporteur for the issue for Botswana?

Say someone who is not really in the government or the opposition who can mediate and come up with a feasible and more sustainable solution? For what it is worth, currently everyone is throwing their weight and views around while the country is getting a battering.

All are defending their side and hope for some reward in public opinion. But Survival International need not be right in their assertion to damage Botswana. Perceptions in politics and public relations at times matter even more than facts. Such is the flaw and at times even irrationality of human beings.

I am yet to see someone come close to adequately answering and bringing a closure to this question. And till then, we shall be a permanent and dominant feature of Survival International home page and other campaigns.

They have nothing to lose; we have a country's reputation and economic wellbeing to lose.