Botswana’s Land Question: Khama vs Basarwa Bushmen

Khama’s Campaign Against Bushmen

Khama is the son of the former President of Botswana and did not just want to take on the position as an ego trip or to fill his father’s shoes but has undoubtedly proved that he is very much his own man. Botswana has one of the highest standards of living in Sub-Saharan Africa, not only is there prosperity but there is peace, little crime a place where people want to raise their children and the future is bright in this oasis in the middle of the desert. That is the single story that the Khama Administration portrays to the world.

The whole story, however, is that Khama is also half British, he is the son of a British mother and an African father. Some commentators and historians have ascribed to him the same accolades that had been given to Nelson Mandela but he was thought to be on the trajectory to becoming one of the finest on the continent of Africa that was until President Khama did the unthinkable.

The Bushmen are the earliest inhabitants of Sub-Saharan Africa. They live in the Kalahari Desert in present day Botswana. Khama has started a resettlement scheme to resettle the Bushmen to New Xade in western Botswana. His grand plan is to turn these hunters and gatherers into farmers. The Bushmen were told they had to leave the reserve soon after diamonds were discovered in the 1980s, but the Botswana government has repeatedly denied that the illegal and forced evictions of the Kalahari Bushmen in 1997, 2002 and 2005 were due to the rich diamond deposits. The government falsely claims that the Bushmen’s presence in the reserve is “incompatible with wildlife conservation,” while allowing a diamond mine and fracking exploration to go ahead on their land.

Effects of illegal land seizure by President Khama’s Government

• Thousands of years of Bushmen culture have been destroyed forever to prepare for western tourism
• Khama administration denied the Bushmen access to water on their tribal lands
• The Bushmen are not allowed to hunt for food in favor of foreign tourists who want to practice game hunting in The Central Kalahari Game reserve for fun
• The Bushmen’s land has been confiscated because of diamonds that lie beneath it to sell Tswana birthright to his mother’s people in the form a London based company
• Government has constructed beer holes to keep the depressed Basarwa people drunk all day so that they cannot fight back for their land

President Khama portrays himself as a democratic leader all the while he is abusing and oppressing the local people who he is supposed to protect.