Zuma's visit presents opportunities

| Thursday August 30, 2012 00:00

'Important' because South Africa is the powerhouse of the continent in many respects; 'difficult' because the relationship has always been skewed in favour of South Africa whose transition to democracy 18 years ago has meant little to Botswana beyond instantaneous cessation of undeclared hostilities after the former pariah state joined the comity of civilised nations.

Of course, there is little doubt that the Big Brother mentality also reflects a willful obstinacy to perpetuate domination that was policy with successive apartheid regimes and mirrors the suffocating incubus that the legacy of white supremacy will remain for some time yet. In short, it simply means power relations among South Africans of different hues have not changed much beyond creating a ferocious coterie of honorary whites out of a singularly elitist black middle class. In one word, South Africa has a long way to go to catch up with itself and the world.

We also find that the visit is an occasion to repeat what we said recently when SACU, the world's oldest customs union, went into a retreat at which the stated aim of the Botswana delegation was to level the playing field. As we said then, SACU was formed in 1910, the year that saw the birth of the Union of South Africa and a more emphatic relegation of Africans to second-class citizenship in southern Africa. Since then, the region has provided a duty- and quota-free market for goods manufactured in South Africa, a situation that has persisted beyond the dawning of independence at the expense of industrial development in Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland and subsequently Namibia. We noted that with South Africa at the centre of growing consumer populations, it became the citadel of industrialisation that decided how much investment may flow to the peripheral consumer states that export jobs to the hostile industrial hub in the form of ever-growing exports. It is this that the Minister of Trade and Industry, Dorcas Makgato-Malesu, has aptly called 'crumbs' that Botswana is no longer prepared to take, especially that the so-called new dispensation in South Africa is experienced by its neighbours as increasingly less harmony within SACU. As we noted, Minister Makgato-Malesu has always been keenly aware that the little that Botswana draws from the SACU revenue pool annoys South Africa to the point where the latter has sought to meddle with the formula for sharing the revenue pool.

This visit is also an occasion to iron differences over extradition of suspects in crime and civil matters in such a manner that South Africa does not become a veritable safe haven for fugitives from justice from Botswana when the country is bursting at the seams with some of the world's most abominable criminals.

As is well-known, Botswana's lone ranger approach to international affairs is a sticky point with our pan-Africanist neighbour whose alacrity to abide disreputable regimes is equally problematic for Botswana.  These matters and others present themselves for attention during this visit.

                   Today's thought

     'Opportunities multiply as they are seized.'

                      - Sun Tzu