Living On A Wing And A Prayer

Kgosietsile Ngakaagae | Friday February 5, 2021 11:01

Granted, the company has not disclosed reasons for termination of the contract. It is a no brainer, though, that such is a business decision. Had it been a contractual dispute, same would have leaked out, by now. Besides, the company would certainly, have done it all in a relaxed and phased manner, cognizant, among others, of both the business implications of the move on the contractor, and the socio economic implications on the employees and those that depend on them. Further, the company would not be moving contract work that was only further outsourced, in 2019, in-house.

Word has it that only a section of operational employees of the company might be absorbed by Debswana. The rest will be in the streets, with loans, mortgages and school fees to pay. Hundreds of jobs will be lost, all at the flick of a switch. Livelihoods will be lost. Majwe Mining, has fallen, to COVID19, one might say; and Debswana is simply in a state of hypoxia. Whichever way one might choose to look at it, the moment of reckoning is here, and President Masisi’s government is undergoing a litmius test. There is no waiting out the storm.

The present state of affairs, was forseable. Our economy is based on a commodity whose value, for the most part, is purely sentimental.  The 2008, recession, sent a strong warning, on how badly things could go if we maintain our overreliance on diamonds. Thirteen years on, we have been no wiser. We spend time praising mananeo a borraetsho and singing praise songs about our presidents. We contend ourselves with PR stunts which have nothing to do with economic transformation or the socio-economic upliftment of our people. We have never demanded accountability on our government for the singular, time worn promise of economic transformation.

 It is easy to blame it all on COVID19, but that would be denialism. Our present situation was reasonably foreseeable. We are the architects of our own misfortune. We are gullible citizenry that spends time praising leaders and insulting those who call them out to account. Where they have clearly failed, we are quick to excuse them, and blame other people or circumstances. How many times have you heard some people say, “yeah, I agree he failed but I appreciate that he was decisive”. How many times have you heard people say, “at least we can talk on our phones without having to look over our shoulders”. We are getting exactly, what we paid for.

We first had to sit over a catfight between the current President and the man who handpicked him. COVID19, in its evil, saved us the boring and useless catfight, and changed the narrative. Then followed a needless state of emergency, enacted to do things that were perfectly possible under the Public Health Act. And now, the mining sector is in dire straits.

We need delivery on manifesto promises. When, in 2019, the nation voted President Masisi’s party into power, we were not looking for a “lesser evil”. We were looking for leadership that could acquit itself on own merit, and not on the supposed demerits of others. Where on earth is the electric car? Where is the constitutional review commission? Where are all the lofty manifesto promises? Show us some sign, however faint, that we are at least off the starting blocks.

Now, Debswana is not just any company. It is a company, part owned by government. The contract termination can only have happened with government’s blessing, and given the notice period thereof, it has all the hallmarks of a company in a state of panic. In essence, government is retrenching, albeit indirectly, in order to keep Debswana on its feet.  Yet government, being fully responsible for the socio economic implications of the decision thereof, seems altogether at sea, regarding being had to how the imminent suffering will be ameliorated. Clearly the mining contractor would also be in a conundrum with regards to other business contracts with third parties. Such contracts will have to retrench too. It’s a domino effect. We will need leadership. All eyes on the President and our largely clueless cabinet. It no longer matters, whether government extends the state of emergency by three months or six months. It no longer matters whether the curfew begins at seven or eight o’ clock in the evening. We have largely become desensitized to the incursion into our freedoms, after nearly a year of being ruled by decree. What matters is that the economy is in dire straits, and government must address the nations candidly on the prognosis and solutions.

We have had some serious knocks in the mining sector over the last few years, the closure of BCL, being the most significant. The economy survived, even as families were devastated, and Selibi Phikwe virtually became a ghost town overnight. The best hotels now look haunted and dilapidated. Everything held together, because diamonds were selling. As long as diamonds are selling, we are okay. Diamonds, are the glue that has been holding everything together for fifty years, not our leaders. Spending diamond money, is the only thing the government has learnt since independence. It is not time to excuse our leaders. No leader is voted into power on the understanding that they will only be judged on what they do in fair weather. It is time to hold them to account.