“Motor Sport, we cannot ignore that your house is not in order. Do something about that as a matter of urgency.
There have been so many concerns from sport lovers; we have been reading from newspapers that sporting codes such as motor sport, chess, volleyball amongst others are having issues. We cannot be happy when things like that happen. Sponsors cannot associate with you when your things are not in order.
I hope you will correct yourselves together with your committee,” Rakgare said. Rakgare said they cannot have a champion in the Dakar Rally while back at home, the house is on fire. He added that issues at the sport should be sorted out. Responding to Rakgare’s remarks, Tumisang Modibedi said the minister is not only referring to the executive committee alone to fix their house, but also BMS members included.
He said some of the things that are always found in the media are untruthful. “Some of our members are wayward. We have had instances where members wanted to sabotage us as the leadership. Last year we were to take a team to Cape Town. We did not have a budget for that because our allocation from Botswana National Sport Commission (BNSC) is not enough; we had to look for sponsors.
All of our sudden we read on social media members complaining that BMS is requesting parents to pay for their children for the Cape Town trip,” he said. Modibedi said it is clear that there are some members who are not supporting him. “As we are going for an elective Annual General Meeting (AGM), whoever they vote for, I will rally behind that person. I have received abuse from the members since becoming the BMS president. I am a human being at the end of the day. It would reach a point where I would not take it anymore. I provided stability in BMS. When we go to international meetings, people used to laugh at us because we always changed presidents.
I cannot deny that there are some mistakes that we are making as the executive committee, but there should be a formal manner to correct that,” Modibedi said. He said the only problem that BMS has is having proud members who should change their mindset. Modibedi said Ross’s father, Kevin Branch, was the BMS president.
He left because he was abused and the members removed Simon Modisaemang because they did not want him. Meanwhile, the government through MYSC gifted Branch with P124, 000 for his performance at the Dakar Rally. Presenting the cheque, Rakgare said the P100, 000 is for the second place podium finish, P20, 000 is for qualifying for the Dakar Rally and P4, 000 is participation fee at the international event. The Minister also announced that the government would assist Branch with P100, 000 for the next Dakar Rally.
