Mogae’s stoic fight for natural diamonds
Friday, May 15, 2026 | 100 Views |
Festus Mogae
Long before lab-grown diamonds disrupted the market and long before younger consumers began questioning the relevance of natural stones, Mogae was already fighting a different battle, one that threatened not merely diamond sales, but Botswana’s entire development story.
To understand why Mogae fought so fiercely for natural diamonds, one must return to the chaos of the 1990s, when diamonds became entangled with some of Africa’s bloodiest wars.
“Law and order are the medicine of the body politic and when the body politic gets sick, medicine must be administered.”– B.R. AmbedkarThe amount of money at play threatens to test the integrity of the country’s financial system, giving more reason to why the courts must be fully given leeway to lean on the matter and reach a conclusion.Botswana has spent decades building her reputation as a stable and credible financial jurisdiction.The...