BCP exit disappoints Umbrella

EPHRAIM KEORENG
Staff Writer | Tuesday March 27, 2012 00:00

 

Speaking in an interview with Mmegi yesterday, BNF spokesman Moeti Mohwasa said based on the opposition's bad experiences with the pact model, 'we had thought that the Umbrella would help us to deliver a government to the people'.The BNF, the Botswana Movement for Democracy (BMD) and the Botswana Peoples Party (BPP) have been engaged in Umbrella talks with the hope that the BCP would rejoin them after consulting its membership.However, the BCP leadership made a public announcement last weekend that the party would not be re-joining the talks.

'Given the disagreement among the negotiating parties on the principles that should inform the sharing of constituencies and wards and considering the compromises that were proposed by the BCP to break the deadlock, which were not acceptable to some of the negotiating partners, it is apparent that the Umbrella model is not an attainable option in the short term,' reads the BCP announcement.

'The BCP will therefore not take part in talks aimed at creating an Umbrella party for the 2014 general elections.'Mohwasa said the Umbrella partners had suspended their negotiations last week in order to allow the BCP to wrap up its consultation process. 'But after the BCP decision not to re-join the umbrella, we have decided to go ahead and continue an umbrella meeting on Wednesday,' Mohwasa said.

He said among others, tomorrows meeting will hear reports on tasks delegated the different players, including harmonising the policies of the parties and drafting the umbrella constitution.Commenting on the BCP withdrawal, BMD spokesman Winfred Rasina said: 'We can't be engaging in proposals for partnerships when we already have partners with whom we are finalising modalities.

'The BMD is implementing what our members want. We are following congress and policy assembly resolutions, namely, the Umbrella. We currently have the BNF and the BPP as our official partners.'Rasina said they remained open to anyone who sought their partnership under the Umbrella model.'Individualism is what the BMD will not abide,' he said. 'We can't have individualism and umbrella cooperation at the same time. We 'BCP can look elsewhere if it does not tolerate the Umbrella because we at the BMD are resolute in our position that we will only engage under the Umbrella model.'