The unfolding disturbing political events in Lesotho snowballing from the no-confidence motion against Prime Minister Sam Matekane should prompt Basotho into some serious soul searching about why we can’t seem to get our political house in order 57 years after independence.
We just cannot continue like this. Year after year, political squabbles take centre stage at the expense of economic development. As a result, the country remains a perennial African laggard, underwritten by mass poverty and squalor.
Very sadly, these political squabbles are stoked and motivated by the thirst for power and political self-aggrandisement ahead of sound principles.
Basotho have over the years borne witness to how these perennial power squabbles have hampered their country’s economic development, condemning them to a life of misery despite the country’s massive economic potential in various economic segments.
Lesotho remains one of the most uneven societies in the world with an unsustainable Gini coefficient ratio. We have a few rich people, mostly politicians, whose quest for more riches knows no bounds. They fight not for the people but to get richer.
Since independence in 1966, we remain an economic backwater. We are ranked among the world’s Least Developed Countries (LDCs). That’s not a record to be proud of.
Infrastructure wise, today’s Lesotho is no different from what it was decades ago. The main throughfare, Kingsway Road, remains the same as it was in the 1980s.
Any person who last visited this country in the 1980s, will easily manoeuvre their way around, if they revisit now, because nothing much has changed from what they last saw.
Roads leading into villages across the country resemble dongas. In some places people still carry their dead-on makeshift stretchers, crossing treacherous rivers just to get their deceased relatives and loved ones to mortuaries.
In hard-to-reach areas as a result of the mountainous terrain, those who can afford to, rent choppers to carry their dead to their final resting places. Many Basotho struggle to access clean drinking water yet water is one of our key exports. Health services are in a state of paralysis with basic medical operations having to be undertaken abroad. The education system is equally comatose, unable to breed entrepreneurs who can start and run businesses. Crime and contract killings have become a viable industry.
Lesotho is affectionately referred to as Africa’s Switzerland because of its majestic mountains whose beauty takes one’s breath away during the snowy winter season. But we have been unable to exploit our potential in tourism, a sector that is job intensive and can potentially deliver thousands of citizens out of penury.
Many Basotho struggle to access clean water despite its abundance. We have high grade diamonds which could attract many more miners than the four that are currently operating. But nothing is being done towards that endeavour.
Young graduates from the country’s institutions of higher learning are wasting away at home. They end up looking forward to the only sector that holds the promise of prosperity: politics.
The textile and apparel sector, the biggest employer after the government, has been bleeding jobs at an alarming rate, with 10, 000 jobs lost just this year alone. Other factories survive by laying off workers for months at a time, recalling them only when there are orders.
Lesotho’s textile industry is reliant on the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), a United States of America (USA) government policy allowing qualifying African countries to export different merchandise duty free to the superpower. However, the industry is no longer viable as most investors are abandoning Lesotho for countries like Bangladesh and Vietnam, with developed textile sectors and which are also closer to the US shores. Hence, local factories have had to grapple with a drop in orders, leading to many shutting down.
One would hope finding replacement markets for this vital sector would be an uppermost priority for any politician worth their salt. But we hardly hear anything useful being done in that regard amid the milieu of politicking for power by our political class.
The Ministry of Trade, Industry, Business Development and Tourism, through the Lesotho National Development Corporation (LNDC), is not recording much success in wooing investors. It will not as long as the narrative out there about Lesotho remains one of a country constantly at war with itself, with governments changing like underwear and politicians jostling for pole position to be a minister or deputy minister in the next prospective coalition.
We had begun believing there could be a flicker of hope after the completion of the much-delayed reforms process. We had hoped the reforms process would foster the institutional integrity required for good governance. We had hoped the process would also help foster coherent and durable government instead of the constant coalition changes done at the whim and caprice of politicians bored at being left out of the feeding trough.
Sadly, we are now back to square one. As the politicians – we have entrusted to rule and deliver prosperity for us – prefer to perpetuate their familiar struggles for power; there is no more hope for the completion of the reforms process.
Those agitating to oust Prime Minister Matekane have already smelt blood, after they at one stage seemed to have acquired the majority required to pass a no confidence motion before Professor Nqosa Mahao summersaulted and ditched their camp. Don’t expect them to give up nonetheless. They will press on with their motion and try to regain the numbers. Without their cooperation, the majorities to pass the reforms will not be realised.
On the other side, Mr Matekane’s side has gotten the army commander to essentially stage an advance coup detat should the motion of no confidence pass.
The European Union (EU), one of Lesotho’s most significant development partners, which places a significant premium on good governance, has condemned the meddling of security agencies in parliamentary processes. When institutions like the EU begin to speak loud, the rest of the world listens. Any would be investors listen even more attentively.
We are at a crossroads again.
No investor will consider putting their money in a country constantly at war with itself. Particularly a country on the cusp of being overtaken by criminals, with violent murders having become a daily routine.
The advent of coalition governments since 2012 appear to have marked the beginning of doom. The country’s socio-economic climate has significantly deteriorated ever since, not least because these coalitions are not principle or issue driven. They are just a means to gain power and the concomitant places at the feeding trough.
We cannot blame the generality of Basotho for not demanding accountability of their leaders. They have tried to vote for different parties as soon as the incumbents fail to deliver. Perhaps the problem lies in the electoral system which delivers elections without the concomitant accountability of those elected into power to voters. It needs a complete overhaul.
