Addressing the media yesterday, the former President of Botswana accused De Beers of funding his removal from power in order to avoid paying tax. Masisi said they negotiated the best partnership deal ever globally to deal with a multinational and a country when negotiating with De Beers. He said throughout their interaction with De Beers, a lot of assault was directed at them by the opposition parties then.
He said despite this, they arrived at an agreement to a formula which would result in, after 10 years, annual growth of allocation of all diamonds mined in all Debswana mines shared between De Beers and Government of Botswana.
“At 10 years, we would be sharing the allocation at 50%–50%, unprecedented. Help me ask the UDC government to declare publicly; what concessions did they make? That was a signed agreement which was a living valid agreement. The only thing that had been outstanding, was the issue of tax, because De Beers, when we were talking to them, were willing to sign the heads of terms of agreement, but not ready to sign the mass agreement until they brought in what we thought was an exogenous issue of tax.
“It wasn't material to the negotiations, but they deliberately made it a part to the negotiations and so they said they were going to refuse to sign until the tax issue is settled. But they wanted a political settlement to the issue, something we never do, so we refused to yield,” he said.
Masisi said in the calculation of refusal to sign, particularly the timing of it, and what they saw as apparent outspending by the UDC, by a factor of more than 1:15, it isn't hard to imagine where the finance might have come from.
“I say this with a deep sense of seriousness, because I want to dare De Beers to go and deny that they have been interfering in Botswana politics, including the use of finance. They started within my own party when they financed the so-called Schlemmer report that was window-dressed, sugar-coated to be as if it was a BDP project. It wasn't, it was fundamentally a De Beers project and the greatest beneficiary who then ascended to the leadership of BDP. That wasn't their project and they can't deny that they secretly then financed the retirement of the former president. He said it in public, it is just a matter of time before it becomes public how they managed to finance change of government because of an injury they felt at the negotiation table when we beat them hands down,” he said.
He further challenged the UDC government to come out clean and tell the price paid by watering down a brilliant agreement they had with De Beers.
“We must also get to calculate the real cost of the sacrifice that was made at the expense of Batswana in terms of potential loss of revenue. We warned you about this, that there is no genuine intention on the part of those publicly critisising matters when they don't know what is in the frying pan. They don’t know why they have never challenged this agreement. I was prepared if it took that to lose elections,” he said.
Contacted for a comment, UDC spokesperson Moeti Mohwasa dismissed Masisi’s claims. “Ordinarily, we wouldn't comment on what Masisi says because we know him and his outlandish statements. We have never received any money from De Beers. The onus is on him to produce the proof. He isn't a reliable person as he has proved by swinging statements before. We have been avoiding to respond thinking he was healing from his loss, but he isn't getting better. If he continues spreading falsehoods about the UDC, we will have no choice but to respond mercilessly,” Mohwasa said.
