Gaborone — Botswana's highest court has dealt a blow to the onslaught against President Ian Khama by his opponents in the ruling party by declaring that he enjoys blanket immunity for legal proceedings.

A five-man bench of a special session of the Court of Appeal unanimously ruled on Friday that the High Court was right last month in rejecting an application by Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) secretary general, Mr Gomolemo Motswaledi, seeking to reverse the suspension slapped on him by President Khama in August.

The Court of Appeal upheld the High Court decision that Section 41 of the Botswana constitution grants a sitting president blanket immunity from court proceedings.

The argument

The Court of Appeal judges rejected the argument by South Africa's Senior Counsel, Mr Roland Sutherland, for Mr Motswaledi, that the section needed to be interpreted widely to create a third category in which a president can act besides the 'official or private' capacities.

The Court of Appeal said that the meaning of Section 41 is that when the president acts in a capacity other than as head of state, his act is to be categorised as an act in his private capacity. But the Court of Appeal judges said they were not at liberty to create an intermediate category nor to rewrite the Botswana constitution.