WORKERS' MOVEMENT
The recently resuscitated Botswana Labour Party (BLP), which was originally formed in 1989 has been described by its president, Dr Moiseraele Dibeela as a movement that identifies with the interests of the workers.
“When we say the workers, we are referring to an array of people who are in formal employment, unemployed workers who are sometimes referred to as hustlers, farm workers, informal business owners such as those who run tuckshops and small cattle farmers,” Dibeela said when addressing the party inaugural congress at Lotsane Senior Secondary School in Palapye.
“As the BLP, we believe in organised labour. We believe that the workers should be unionised in order for their voices to be heard in shaping the economy of this country.
“It is also important for informal and rural entrepreneurship to be organised into cooperatives, syndicates and other platforms through which they can represent their interests,” Dibeela explained.
Earlier, the BLP president had made the point that the BLP identifies itself with the politics of the left. The BLP leader added that the policies of this country have been driven by people who were guided by the ideas and structures which were conceived during colonial rule.
According to Dibeela, several studies have shown that poverty in Botswana is on the increase with the gap between the rich and the poor having increased exponentially for the past 10 years.
“The rich are getting richer whilst the poor get more pushed to the margins of the economy,” he cried, adding that Botswana is on a downward spiral economically because the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) government has got no answers to the economic problems bedevilling the country hence the need for “fresh minds.”
Dibeela is worried that although government has poured a lot of money into tertiary education, there is no equivalent effort to grow the economy such that it could absorb the thousands of graduates that the education system has produced over the years.
“Under the BDP rule, Batswana have become spectators and outsiders in the economy of our land. All the major retail shops are owned by foreigners and not a single commercial bank is owned by citizens.
“The tourism industry is a cesspool of racism with the owners living and sometimes even operating from outside the country,” observed Dibeela, who is concerned that there are lodges that use foreign currency and in some cases, payments by patrons is done directly to the concerned foreign country. “Clearly there is racism, capital flight and a deliberate ploy to keep certain areas of the country for the international cartels,” the BLP leader lamented.
“When we say the workers, we are referring to an array of people who are in formal employment, unemployed workers who are sometimes referred to as hustlers, farm workers, informal business owners such as those who run tuckshops and small cattle farmers,” Dibeela said when addressing the party inaugural congress at Lotsane Senior Secondary School in Palapye.
“As the BLP, we believe in organised labour. We believe that the workers should be unionised in order for their voices to be heard in shaping the economy of this country.
“It is also important for informal and rural entrepreneurship to be organised into cooperatives, syndicates and other platforms through which they can represent their interests,” Dibeela explained.
Earlier, the BLP president had made the point that the BLP identifies itself with the politics of the left. The BLP leader added that the policies of this country have been driven by people who were guided by the ideas and structures which were conceived during colonial rule.
According to Dibeela, several studies have shown that poverty in Botswana is on the increase with the gap between the rich and the poor having increased exponentially for the past 10 years.
“The rich are getting richer whilst the poor get more pushed to the margins of the economy,” he cried, adding that Botswana is on a downward spiral economically because the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) government has got no answers to the economic problems bedevilling the country hence the need for “fresh minds.”
Dibeela is worried that although government has poured a lot of money into tertiary education, there is no equivalent effort to grow the economy such that it could absorb the thousands of graduates that the education system has produced over the years.
“Under the BDP rule, Batswana have become spectators and outsiders in the economy of our land. All the major retail shops are owned by foreigners and not a single commercial bank is owned by citizens.
“The tourism industry is a cesspool of racism with the owners living and sometimes even operating from outside the country,” observed Dibeela, who is concerned that there are lodges that use foreign currency and in some cases, payments by patrons is done directly to the concerned foreign country. “Clearly there is racism, capital flight and a deliberate ploy to keep certain areas of the country for the international cartels,” the BLP leader lamented.
