Khama saves the govt a lot of money on travel

Through an answer to a question asked by Francistown South MP, Wynter Mmolotsi, Parliament has been told how much President Ian Khama spent on his domestic travel from April to November this year. While the figure (P490, 434.58 on transport and fuel) might shock some, the fact of the matter is that the president’s travel could have cost a lot more.

This is a question Mmolotsi would never ask because he knows it would portray Khama in good light: “To ask the Minister of Presidential Affairs and Public Administration how many kilometres President Ian Khama logged on meet-and-greet walkabouts this year.” The answer would be that the president logged 200 653 kilometres in unsafe constituencies alone. Had he used official vehicles, the money spent on his domestic travel would have come to P3 million.

Khama’s walkabouts routinely feature a huge entourage of half the cabinet, half the district administration staff, half the police force in a policing district and all the party hangers-on in a constituency. If the first three groups were to use government vehicles, the cost of fuel would be at least P2.5 million per walkabout shindig.

During these walkabouts, the president donates blankets and has thus saved about 32 percent of poor Batswana from frost bite they would otherwise have suffered during the past and next year’s wynter. We stand to be corrected but there is no evidence of Wynter donating blankets to save the poor from wynter.

There is a lot more good that Khama does during these walkabouts. Photographic evidence shot by presidential walkabout correspondents will show that the first citizen is one of the largest supporters of small businesses in the country. At almost every SHHA neighbourhood where he walks about, Khama stops over at a tuckshop to buy small children mabudula, sweets and other kiddies’ treats. If anyone in the opposition has done the same thing, could they please provide photographic evidence of their generosity.

Not only does Khama buy children mabudula, he also picks some of them up and carries them around in his arms. One of the reasons why some children become messed up as adults is because they get no love from their parents. You can bet every pula you have that the children that you see in Khama’s arms during these walkabouts will become very well-rounded because he is giving them extra love.   Compared to his predecessors and possibly his successors (Tshekedi Khama, another yet unnamed Khama and maybe Duma Boko) Khama doesn’t undertake as much international travel as presidents are known to. By not attending United Nations and African Union summits in the period of time that he has been president, Khama has saved Botswana at least P4 billion.

Unlike any president before, Khama also uses his own personal transport. If anyone doubts this, presidential correspondents at Btv will provide footage of him cycling from State House to Old Naledi or riding a quad bike at a Botswana Democratic Party rally.Where the president does not walk or get around in a bicycle or quad, he gets from point A to B by working a rope in an obstacle course. Which president ever did that? Any other president would use a golf cart to tour a cave but as seen on CNN, Khama crawls on his stomach to undertake such tour. Some presidential aspirants, who shall remain anonymous, are not even flat-stomached enough to negotiate some parts of Gcwihaba.

Khama has also saved the government money by volunteering labour that the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning would otherwise have had to pay for. When Robert Mugabe travels by air from Harare to far-flung remote villages with almost-unpronounceable names, somebody else will be flying the plane. On the other hand, chances are that when Khama flies from Gaborone to Kasane, he will be in the pilot’s seat.

We don’t know what the Umbrella for Democratic Change’s position on climate change is because the party doesn’t have a policy on this issue but by opting for non-vehicular modes of transport, Khama has greatly reduced Botswana’s ecological footprint, in turn mitigating the effects of climate change. It is because of the president’s actions that Botswana got an AA climate change rating from Moody’s Investor Services, the highest in Africa. Rather than criticise Khama at every turn, opposition politicians should be emulating him – or at least trying to. If you go to a UDC rally, chances are that the entertainment fare will be the usual: a parade of traditional dance troupes and record deal-less kwaito outfits from the neighbourhood. They would be providing the same entertainment you saw three years ago and which - quite frankly, has become boring. Not so Khama rally. The president himself gets down, typically busting pantsula moves he secretly learnt in the 1980s.