Batswana feel they are in a drowning Titanic

President of the Botswana Congress Party (BCP), Dumelang Saleshando on Saturday called upon the nation to listen to the prognosis of his party regarding the country because their predictions always come to pass.

He was officially opening the party conference in Tutume.

“Despite our warning that a new Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) leader can never perform better than the BDP record and that BDP and corruption cannot be separated, they refused to heed our warning,” Saleshando said.

Against the BCP advice, according to Saleshando, the nation clamoured for Masisi to succeed the then outgoing Ian Khama. This, according to Saleshando, was despite the fact that the incoming President 'was the spokesperson in chief of all that had gone wrong in the Botswana.”

According to Saleshando, “Now we are here beyond the crossroads we warned about in 2014. We are in a total mess! People must learn to listen to our warnings. We have been proven, time and time again to be correct in our prognosis.

“Many Batswana feel that they are in a drowning Titanic. Unemployment remains high and for the youth, reaching age of retirement with no single opportunity for formal employment is a reality even for those with tertiary qualifications,” the BCP leader said.

Nor is Saleshando happy with the healthcare system which according to him, is in a state of paralysis as it is not equipped to respond to the most basic ailments. The education sector is on its knees and “corruption is on the rise,” Saleshando lamented.

In his view, Botswana is drowning and needs to be saved. He agrees with findings that Botswana is indeed one of the foremost unhappy nations.

“It is true. We are an unhappy nation because we have nothing to celebrate. It is when desperation is at its highest that the risk of repeating past mistakes, the risk of opting for the nearest devil out of the belief that the next available devil is better than the devil we know looms high.

“It is when a nation is in a deeply desperate state, such as present day Botswana, that we could usher back the Master of the Extra Judicial Killings, the architects of the DISS we fear, the champions of entrenched corruption and believe that in so doing we will have achieved regime change! A sinking man can seek refuge in the mouth of a shark out of desperation, this is to be expected,' Saleshando said.

Further, adding that they have a duty to caution Batswana about the options that will be on the table in the general elections of 2024 and save them from the false belief that turning back to the former regime is not regime change!

Saleshando told the meeting that the conference was a historic one because it is happening only 15 months before the general elections and will make the final decision as to how the BCP will contest.

“We have in effect and in principle agreed that we will contest the coming elections. In 2019 we contested as part of the UDC which has presented its own challenges,” Saleshando said, but noted that his party was going to work with its new partners to save the country from total collapse and the failed state that it is.

“We will work together with our new partners to save this country from total collapse,” Saleshando, who pledged that the BCP is committed to saving Botswana, said.