Isaac Pinielo
20 November 2009
Francistown — Despite the fact that he quit after disaster had struck, Bernard Balikani has said he left the Botswana Peoples Party (BPP) presidency a happy man.
The 44-year-old father of two said that during his six-year reign, he raised the profile of the party and made it known to more people.
He stated that he built offices for the party at Francistown Block One Location, near Chedu Choga shopping complex.
Though the party is not yet using the building, it has been rented to car dealers.
"We are still waiting for the electricity to be installed before we can use the building. Meanwhile the party is getting some money from the rentals paid by the car dealers," Balikani said.
He stated that under his watch, the BPP computerised its record keeping system and introduced primary elections and extra-ordinary conferences to deepen democracy.
He said that he will take time off to concentrate on his furniture retailing business and arable farming at Maitengwe village.
He expressed confidence in the new party leader under his successor Whyte Marobela. He said that he joined the BPP in 1993 and when he assumed leadership of the party in 2003, the party had only two councilors.
In the party polls he helped the party to win four council seats. After the elections, they got a fifth councillor after a defection from the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP).
"It is during my leadership that this party got supporters from other parties and realised growth, until the downturn in the 2009 elections that led to my resignation," he said.
He stated that most of the party's troubles started in 1999 when it merged with other opposition parties to form the Botswana Alliance Movement (BAM).
He said the BPP is the only party that has participated in most opposition cooperation talks. "These opposition alliances divided us. After the 1999 elections, we lost most of our members to BAM. Almost the whole of our central committee defected to BAM.
This is why we are very cautious nowadays about opposition cooperation," said Balikani. He explained that they lost members to BAM because the BPP leadership did not communicate well with the grassroots. Balikani made his electoral debut in 1994 as a parliamentary candidate in Francistown East and got 2,010 voters, while the winner Patrick Balopi of the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) scooped 2,873 votes ahead of Peter Woto of the BNF with 2,563. In 2004, he got 1,509 votes behind the winner Tshelang Masisi of the BDP (3,500) and Marobela who had 1,539 under the Botswana Congress Party (BCP). However, when he got a measly 289 votes in last month's general elections, he decided to quit.
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