Rev Dr Prince Dibeela, Parliamentary candidate for Gaborone Bonnington North
I am a Parliamentary candidate for the Gaborone Bonnington North constituency. I am therefore an interested party in the conduct of the elections that are supposed to take place in the constituency. Of course, even if I wasn’t a candidate I would still be interested in a proper conduct of our elections as a country. The peace and democratic credentials of this country are dependent on a proper conduct of our general elections.
However, I want to be categorical and state that the so-called elections over the weekend were a shambles. First, we became aware around lunchtime that the ballot papers for two wards, Peolwane and Marapoathutlwa North, had finished. People waited for more than four hours hoping the ballots would arrive but to no avail. Obviously, some started drifting away as the waiting was unreasonably long.
Some would go and come back but the story remained the same. Generally, the electorates waited patiently, in a mosquito infested environment, often with insufficient briefings. This was supposed to be a small operation that involved just a few people that were the advanced party for our general elections.
The IEC knew the number of people that they expected to vote on the day. How then was it possible for them to supply fewer ballot papers than the expected numbers? What is even more curious is that this was not an isolated case – reports indicate that it happened throughout the country.
The conduct of the IEC team throughout the day was problematic. Either they are not trained to deal with such contentious situations, or they were deliberately obstinate in their dealing with the stakeholders.
At around 6:30 pm all the representatives of the parties at GBN, safe for the BDP, approached the returning officer and asked her to call off the elections as many people were being disenfranchised by the unprepared nature of the IEC. They argued that not being able to provide the required ballots for the exercise denied the citizens of this country the right to exercise their democratic right to vote.
She flatly refused and said she would rather extend the time once the ballots had arrived. The team argued that many people had already given up and left after waiting for over four hours. It was not their fault that the IEC had not prepared adequately for the elections, therefore a fresh date should be set where everything will be in place.
The presiding officer would not relent and instead argued that those who had left could find time on the 30th October 2024 to vote. Obviously, this was absurd as the people in question would either be working somewhere in the country or might need to travel from their work- station to come and vote.
It goes without saying that this election arrangement is made in cognisance of the fact that on the general election day it would be nearly impossible for civil servants on duty to go out to vote. It just seemed like this is a calculated and deliberate way of excluding this particular group of people from voting.
Just before 19:00 hrs the Returning officer announced excitedly that the ballots they had been waiting for had arrived. They announced that they were extending the voting period by two hours, and that they would close the school gate at 21:00 hrs. Although there was some grumblings about that the elections went on.
The public servants remained patient and had waited until now to exercise their democratic right. However, it soon became apparent that there had been only one ballot book that had arrived, and in fact it had only 21 ballots instead of the 25 per book, which is the standard. This, in itself, was problematic as it raised the question as to who tempered with the ballot book – that it ended up with less than 4 ballots.
Just around 20:30 hrs there was more shortage as another ward, Marapoathutlwa South, revealed that its ballots were finished. As though that was not enough the ballots for the Parliamentary candidates also ran out before the closing time.
The presiding officer told everyone they would close as there was nothing more they could do. When asked what would happen to those who could not vote he repeated what they had said earlier that they can find time to vote on the 30th October 2024.
Some of us argued that they should consult the IEC office, which they flatly denied. When we insisted that this was a national election, under the jurisdiction of the IEC, the returning officer then said she had in fact consulted them. This obviously meant that the IEC had okayed the closure of the polling station even though the queue was still long, and people had been waiting the whole day to vote. Our view that another date should be set for the election to be completed was simply brushed aside.
There was clear consternation throughout the day, and the obvious question on everyone’s mind is – if they can’t manage such a small operation what will happen on the 30th October 2024?
Is this situation, which apparently was nation-wide, an indication of incompetence and lack of preparedness or is it part of an orchestrated plan to steal the elections? Is it a plan to exclude people who have become increasingly unhappy with the mismanagement of the economy of the country, and who it is felt might not vote in favour of the status quo?
