Is Khama speaking for himself?

His argument is that the SADC region has failed to act against fraudulent victors in the Zimbabwean poll of July 2013 that returned Robert Mugabe’s ZANU PF to power.  Zimbabwe went to those elections five years after ZANU PF and the country’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) had formed a troubled Government of National Unity following unremitting violence and bloodletting that erupted in the run-up to a re-run of presidential elections in 2008. Former Vice President Mompati Merafhe returned from Zimbabwe post the 2013 poll and characterised the exercise as nothing but a circus. The results, he said, should be treated accordingly. 

A few days later, the government distanced itself from Merafhe’s conclusions and advanced the view that the Zim elections had been free but not fair. No audit was therefore necessary, it concluded, openly controverting – even excoriating – Merafhe, who had been a member of the government’s observer mission.  It was a moment to savour solidarity with the SADC region whose observer mission had also come to the conclusion of free but not fair, citing a raft of irregularities.