3RDi

Life presidencies much safer

A social media post in which Gwede Mantashe, a South African cabinet minister, excoriates African presidents who want to rule from the grave recently went viral. Interestingly, while he characterises this as an African phenomenon, the reality is that it is actually global. In the SADC region, the prominent examples are those of Ian Khama (Botswana) and Jacob Zuma (South Africa). However, a holistic view of this matter reveals that even in the supposedly democratic west, former presidents also want to rule from the grave. One (Donald Trump) didn’t even want to step down after losing elections – whereupon law enforcement had to quietly plan for a scenario in which he had to be dragged out of the White House kicking and screaming. In Europe, Boris Johnson is quietly planning to end the colonisation of Britain by an Indian. More interesting is that no one has proposed solutions to this problem. We propose two. Firstly, there should be an addiction treatment programme for national leaders in the last two years of office. Political power, like a type of SADC malt beer called Power, is addictive and there should be a clinical plan to help leaders kick this addiction. In that regard, Masisi’s treatment programme should have begun in late September of last year. Supposing there is not enough expertise to treat this addiction – which is worse than that an imbiber gets from drinking Power, then presidents shouldn’t step down. In other words, state presidency should be a lifetime appointment. Come to think of it, Botswana would still be Africa’s most politically stable nation if Khama was still president. Sure, the 24/7 booze bar in Block 6, Gaborone wouldn’t have come into being, an officially undeclared curfew for adults would still be in force and DIS would still be literally cracking skulls with axes but there wouldn’t be the political circus we are seeing every day.

‘Ke tagilwe ke letsatsi’

As University of Botswana Vice Chancellor, Professor Thabo Fako, routinely expressed grave concern about degree-conferring two-and-half-roomed houses being magically turned into “universities” and being mostly staffed by lecturers who themselves had never darkened the doorway of a university lecture room. At one such university, a secondary school drop-out from Kenya “taught” business law to degree students. Resultantly, Fako implored the powers-that-be to legally protect the word “university.” Similarly, the Botswana Alcohol Industry Association should advocate for legal protection of “drunk” and its variant forms. With summer setting in, some teetotallers are starting to talk about “drunkenness” that they get from the heat. They express this with “Ke tagilwe ke letsatsi”, meaning “I am drunk from the heat.” Saying this when your body has never experienced the extreme physical torture that alcohol causes should be criminalised in much the same way that the United States penal code criminalises lying about having served in the army when you haven’t. The charge is called “stealing valour.” Saying “Ke tagilwe ke letsatsi” when you don’t know the sort of hangover that you get from drinking all night or consuming a whole bottle of Stroh 60 is stealing valour. Beer, whiskey, gin, liqueur or whatever type of alcohol has a percentage of alcohol concentration that is typically written on the container. None of the teetotallers claiming to be drunk from the heat when they have never actually scorched their tongues with fire water, can tell the alcohol percentage of heat from the sun. And, if they really want to get an idea of what drunkenness feels like, they should drink two six-packs of Black Label beer on an empty stomach. They will pass out and when they get to, will begin to put respect on “drunk.”

Masisi plagiarising Ratsie Sethako

We don’t know whether the responsibility falls to the government or President Mokgweetsi Masisi himself but whatever the case, Ratsie Sethako’s descendants should be getting paid for using his ideas. When the government has merely used terms from the west – like balanced score card – it has paid the originators lots and lots of money. So how much has the government – or Masisi, paid Sethako’s descendants for harvesting concepts from his hit song, “A re Chencheng”? You can almost hear the song’s melody each time Masisi speaks about Reset Agenda and Mindset Change.

Sitting for vs writing exams

While we are on the subject of language use and with the examinations season upon us, it may be opportune to consider two exam-related phrases: sitting for an examination and writing an examination. As a matter of standard practice, there should be a standard question in all exams that requires candidates to explain the difference between the two. Sitting for an examination and writing an examination are two different things as revealed by the literal meanings. Those who sit for an examination uniformly fail while some of those who write it can pass. Think back to your schooling days. There were classmates who never had a snowball’s chance in hell of passing an exam. These students literally sat down to write an exam but never actually wrote it and returned blank answer sheets. That is where the difference lies. We wish everyone who will be sitting for examinations good luck and urge them to actually write (and not just sit for) the exams.