The dark days of Botswana�s birth

Kgosi Sekgoma II welcomes the Prince of Wales to Serowe in 1925 PIC: COURTESY OF SANDY GRANT
Kgosi Sekgoma II welcomes the Prince of Wales to Serowe in 1925 PIC: COURTESY OF SANDY GRANT

The story of the Three Chiefs is known by all and standard fare among Batswana, right? In 1895, Khama III, Sebele I and Bathoen I travelled to Great Britain to ask Joseph Chamberlain, Secretary of State for the Colonies, and Queen Victoria to separate the Bechuanaland Protectorate from Cecil Rhodes's British South Africa Company and Southern Rhodesia (present day Zimbabwe).

Not exactly, argues Professor Part Mgadla, a historian and the director of Confucius Institute. Last Thursday, at the first of a series of lectures on the country’s milestones since independence at the University of Botswana, Mgadla made his intentions clear: he intended to debunk “myths and misconceptions” surrounding the legendary trip undertaken by the three chiefs to London.

He said it was 10 years after Bechuanaland had been declared a protectorate by the British that the chiefs went to Britain.

Editor's Comment
The State apparatus must be sanitised

When the State cannot rely on its own machinery to pursue suspected wrongdoing, repairing that machinery must become a national priority.The establishment of a Special Investigations and Asset Recovery Task Force may help government respond to the immediate challenge. However, Botswana cannot afford to leave the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime (DCEC) and the Directorate of Public Prosecutions (DPP) struggling whilst building...

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