Keorapetse said this when responding to the State of the Nation Address (SONA) that was delivered on Monday by the President. He revealed that in 2023 alone, Botswana recorded 215 murder cases, 1, 718 rape cases and 1, 331 defilement cases. “We are unsafe under this President as a nation, total serious selected offences stand at 12, 853. This year alone as of September, 239 Batswana killed themselves and last year the number stood at 391. Moreover, the police have recorded 11, 566 accidents exacerbated by bad roads such as the notorious A3 road, which has been the outstanding President’s promise since 2018,” he said. Keorapetse stated that according to Bertelsmann Stiftung’s Transformation Index (2022) since the last review period, the power of elected political representatives to govern appears to have deteriorated, with President Masisi seeming to be intolerant of his opponents. “The director general of the DISS, Peter Magosi, appears to be above the rules, as he has continuously undermined fundamental elements of democratic procedures and institutions, including the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime (DCEC). President Masisi has ignored calls to dismiss Peter Magosi,” he said.
Furthermore, Keorapetse said the report is not surprising because under Masisi’s presidency, a record number of five legislators and journalists have been detained by law enforcement agencies, especially the DIS, which also seized their phones for more than a year. Keorapetse explained that most, if not all of the said arrests, were made without warrants and were without any legal basis or reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing as almost all have not been criminally charged. “The meddling of the DIS in tenders in the last five years has been unprecedented. It purportedly does security clearance and has used this to interfere in government procurement system. Because of the DIS meddling, a company was paid P100 million plus after it was elbowed out of a water project tender for frivolous claims that it was a threat to National security,” he said. He stated that the company and its directors are based in Botswana and have never been charged for any wrongdoing related to national security. Additionally, he said the company, which took over the project, is more expensive than the previous one by about P200 million.
