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CORRUPTION AND MISMANAGEMENT 5I3Reactions to ExposuresThe immediate response of several Minister was to assert that theirlarge loans and indebtedness were actually all the fault of the NDB.Sebego said that 'my arrears [of P730,ooo] are not that high. They areprobably half that figure written on the [debtors] list'.46 Merafheclaimed that 'it is just that accounts at NDB are in a mess'.47 Althoughthis might have been wholly or partially true by early I 994, it ignoredthe related question of ministerial responsibility in the making of themess in the first place. His colleague, Mogwe, nevertheless agreed,explaining that 'The thing is the NDB never reminds us to pay and weforget.' He also suggested that his debts were only normal, addingdisarmingly, 'We are human too.'48 President Masire reportedly paidthe Bank what was outstanding on his debt shortly before saying that'I had a problem like all farmers of sometimes being in arrears. '49 Theeffectiveness of this Everyman argument suffered from the patent factthat by no means all farmers, for example, enjoyed any such access toNDB funds. It might be normal to want a loan, but it was decidedlyabnormal to receive one of hundreds of thousands of Pula and not beobliged to repay.A third reaction was to criticise the exposure, and to attack thosewho sought to investigate the role of the ruling elite in the NDB'scollapse. President Masire declared that it was all 'unethical', and that'the media should refrain from this witch hunt'."5 The Minister ofForeign Affairs, Dr Gaositwe Chiepe, also attacked the press, claiming:'We are breeding ... a culture of mistrust and abuse where you bundleeveryone into one group without verifying the facts'.51 Notably,however, no serious rebuttal or revision of the released figures wasforthcoming throughout the considerable commotion that extended forsome weeks. Newspapers added to the sensationalism by alleging thatthe collective debt of BDP Ministers and MPs to the NDB was P3omillion.52 University students and other concerned citizens held twolively protest demonstrations in Gaborone, but the governing elite wasnot pressed for further information.46Ibid. 47 Guardian, ii48Botswana Gazette, 9 February I994.February I994.49 Ibid. i6 February and Mmegi, i8 February I994.50Botswana Gazette, i6 February 1994. Vister Moruti, a specially elected MP, took this pointa little further, reportedly saying that the press had revealed the list of NDB debtors in order towitch-hunt those in power. Midweek Sun, I6 February I994.51 Mmegi, 25 February 1994.52 Botswana Gazette, i6 February, and Mmegi, editorial, i8 February I994.
514 KENNETH GOODWhile the leadership concentrated on a few inadequate counterarguments,what they conspicuously did not offer to the public was adetailed explanation of either the extent of their loans and accumulatedindebtedness, or the circumstances in which they were acquired andmaintained. For example: who had initially authorised the loans andon what basis and collateral? who had approved the cancellations ofvarious debts, and had the Ministers themselves been beneficiaries?how had many remained in arrears on repayments for so long, and onwhose authority? Although unethical behaviour was alluded to bymore than one Minister, their accountability on this crucial matterremained entirely absent.53 No resignations resulted.Instead, it was certain subordinate though participant elements inthe problem who have implicitly, in the context of the time, borne theresponsibility; at least I29 of those working for the NDB, some 50 percent of the Bank's staff, were declared to be redundant in JanuaryI994.54 When angry students demonstrated outside the House ofAssembly the following month, they said that 'because of the failure ofthe Members of Parliament and Ministers to pay the NDB its money,innocent workers are having to pay by losing their jobs '.55 It remainedpossible that not even full repayment of debts might be required of theleadership,56 but although the Minister of Finance was again beingcriticised by some government MPs for not writing off more NDBloans, Mogae had publicly listed reasons during his press conference inJanuary why any further cancellations would be unfair.57 For its part,the Bank's new management did not aim at the full recovery of alldebts. Rohan's position in February I994 was described as being oneof optimism for the recovery of either some, or a substantial amount, ofthe millions of Pula owed to the NDB, and this over an unspecifiedperiod.5853 Some recognition of the matter's seriousness, at least, did come from within the ruling party'sorganisation, when the BDP's Administration Secretary, Aobakwe Sekgwa, reportedly said thatthe unpaid loans did 'not augur well for the NDB and it is an embarrassment to the governmentand BDP'. Guardian, i i February I 994.5' The Minister of Finance announced that some ?NDB departments were overstaffed and thatthe retrenchements would reduce the Bank's expenditure. Guardian, i i February I994.`5 Botswana Gazette, i6 February I994.56 The position of the ex-Assistant Minister of Local Government was perhaps different, givenhis earlier r6le at BHC. In December I993 the High Court in Lobatse ordered that MichaelTshipinare's large farm at Sekokwane in the Barolong District be sold to pay off his debts, totallingthen more than P5oo,ooo, to the NDB. Guardian, I7 December I993.5' Mmegi, I4 January I994. The Minister of Finance's name was absent from the list ofministerial debtors, and the student demonstrators voiced their support for him and urged, as theysaid, that he 'stay the course'. Midweek Sun, i6 February I994.58 As reported in the Guardian, i8 February I994.
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