The dark days of Botswana�s birth :: Mmegi Online

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.

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