Minister mum as Kgosana ignores court order to vacate office
The Minister of Local Government and Rural Development Kgotla Autlwetse seems not to be ready to address the burning Mmutlane bogosi saga.
The war is raging on while the minister and his officials shy from saying a word about the matter.
It has been nine months since Lobatse High Court Judge Modiri Letsididi ruled that Ketlaareng Lekhutlile be removed from her position as Kgosana of Mmutlane village. However, she has not moved an inch.
To this day, she still occupies the high Mmutlane royal chair without fear or intimidation. Lekhutlile has stuck to her words that the court order does not scare her. She told The Midweek Sun this immediately after Letsididi’s judgement back in 2022.
Anyone who wants her out and has guts, will have to physically throw her out of the Kgotla.
The ministry’s Public Relations Unit washed its hands clean from the matter when reached for comment. Minister Autlwetse said late last year when reached for comment that he was too busy to address the matter.
He repeated the same thing when contacted this week. “I am too busy today, I have people in front of me now, we are in a meeting. I am not available the entire day. I will also be travelling tomorrow. I am not sure if I will find time on Wednesday but you can check then,” Autlwetse said.
This publication is in possession of a letter that disgruntled Mmutlane villagers who took government to court over its decision to have Lekhutlile as their Kgosana, wrote to Minister Autlwetse two months ago asking why government has not implemented the 2022 court order.
“We are concerned by the lack of implementation of the High court order on the part of Government. We are impeded to hold consultation meetings by the presence and control of our Kgotla by the sitting Kgosana, Mme Ketlaareng Lekhutlile,” the letter reads.
The disgruntled villagers allege that Minister Autlwetse has not responded to the letter.
Meanwhile, court documents seen by The Midweek Sun suggest that the ousted Lekhutlile who is still not ready to step down feels government, through the Attorney General, was not representing her interests in court when 53 people identifying themselves as Mmutlane villagers filed an application to remove her from her position in 2021.
With that, she will not be accepting Letsididi’s 2022 order and through a fresh application that she has now made, wants court to nullify Letsididi’s order.
In her affidavit, Lekhutlile said that when the case began, nobody came to her to inform her that she had been cited in court papers as a respondent in a matter where her Kgosana title is being questioned.
“That our rights were unprotected, we first found out two weeks following delivery of the judgement when I saw an article in a newspaper. That was in early September 2022,” she said.
She argued that The Attorney General did not involve her or keep her abreast with court proceedings such that the case continued without her having any legal representation even though the whole case was about her.
In full support of Lekhutlile is Kgosi Felix Kgamane who through his affidavit said that at the material time, he was Kgosi of the main village of Shoshong, which the smaller villages of Mmutlane and others fall under.
All Dikgosana reported to him and he supervised them, including Lekhutlile.
Kgamane was also cited as a respondent on Lekhutlile 2021 case and had availed himself to defending himself and placing his own version before court for consideration.
But he waited in vain to speak to whoever was availed to represent him.
“I was never called and later learned much to my shock, from the second applicant (Lekhutlile) that judgement had been given against us. This was in August 2022,” Kgamane said.
In response, the 53 villagers through their attorneys Ndadi law firm said through their notice to raise points of law that the application made by Lekhutlile and Kgamane is incompetent as Lekhutlile is in contempt of the 2022 court order.
They argue that their application ought to have been brought timeously as soon as the judgement was delivered but the applicants were only doing so after seven months.