Whither Botswana

DAN MOABI | Friday September 2, 2011 00:00

The current structure of Parliament is such that for the next three years, it is going to be rendered irrelevant by the executive... The executive has 24 ministers and assistant ministers while the BDP only has 14 backbenchers. Once cabinet has taken a decision, it is then put to a vote at a party caucus' - Sunday Standard, August 21-27, 2011).  Rammidi did not bother to tell us about the outcome of such votes because that was fairly obvious - the cabinet always wins.

But this has been a potential problem ever since this country achieved independence in 1966. This has been so because the country's constitution prescribed for us a system of government similar in many ways to the British one. Botswana's system assigns to Parliament the exclusive power to enact laws, while the cabinet not only drafts almost all such laws (unlike in Britain), but also sits in Parliament and votes to enact such laws.

It was, therefore, inevitable that this potential problem would materialise in Botswana (with a much smaller Parliament than the British one) as the volume and complexity of government business increased, leading in turn to increases in the size of the cabinet. Hence, as Rammidi pointed out in his comment quoted above, there are now 24 government ministers and assistant ministers in Botswana. This constitutes 39 percent of the country's parliamentarians! By way of comparison, the British cabinet would need to have 254 members to constitute 39 percent of the House of Commons, which is impossible.

It, therefore, appears somewhat unfair of Rammidi to regard President Ian Khama as solely to blame for the inability of the Botswana Parliament to exert more influence on the legislative programme of the President in Parliament. Nor is Khama unique in being eager to see his government achieve all of its legislative objectives. After all, heads of government around the world have similar ambitions to win every parliamentary battle.

Some might argue, however, that the problem with the approach adopted by Khama in seeking to achieve his government's objectives is that he exerts too much pressure on BDP members and parliamentarians to support him in this regard. The following quote from the edition of the Sunday Standard referred to above is a good example of such pressure: 'Rammidi explained how, for the first time in the history of the BDP, the recent national congress and national council passed resolutions binding party members to support the president. The party structures resolved that 'cabinet, MPs and councillors must be seen to be supporting the president.''

Rammidi then concluded: 'The BDP is handling its leadership with kid gloves.' With these words, I think he hit the nail precisely on the head. The biggest problem facing the BDP is not that Khama demands excessive support from the ordinary members of the party and its parliamentarians. Rather, the problem is simply that the members of the party, and especially the cabinet seem to handle their leader 'with kid gloves'.

Khama would not be where he is in the party or in the government if it was not for the support that he got from both the ordinary members of the party and its parliamentarians. There should, therefore, be no reason for these members of the BDP to feel that for some unknown reason they are helpless in the face of their president's demand for support from them. Given the democratic traditions of this country, why do they feel that they owe their president unquestionable loyalty on everything he does or wants? Consider, for instance, the results of the two elections held at the Kanye congress of the BDP.

The first election was for the leadership of the party, and Khama was elected unopposed - an impressive show of support for him. This was followed a day or two later by the election of a new party central committee. Strangely, at this crucial stage of the proceedings of the congress, members of the Barata-Phathi faction routed virtually all the candidates that had clearly enjoyed the support of the president in the run-up to the election.

This was a devastating blow to Khama, which seemed very strange given the massive support for him at the earlier election. It was as though the party had been suddenly afflicted by a severe case of multiple-personality disorder: expressing unqualified support for Ian Khama as its leader one day, and doing the direct opposite on the next day or two.

All of which was, of course, followed shortly afterwards by the huge battle between then newly-elected party Secretary general, Gomolemo Motswaledi, fully supported by his Barata-Phathi colleagues and Khama. Given the hostility that followed between the party's president and the remaining Barata-Phathi  members in the central committee, it puzzled me why the recent congress did not simply vote for a different leader. This docility towards the leader is what increasingly weakens the BDP.