The southern African region has made significant democratic achievements since the 1990s following a wave of ferocious internal conflicts in Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo. In order for this progress to be sustained, the region requires viable political parties, which play a key role in a democracy. The majority of parties currently in power in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region—such as the African National Congress in South Africa, the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP), the Lesotho Congress for Democracy, the Frente de Libertação de Moçambique, Zambia’s Movement for Multiparty Democracy, and Namibia’s SWAPO Party—are powerful while their opposition parties are generally fragmented and weak. There is a clear need to provide technical assistance to opposition parties so that they can pose a significant challenge to the ruling parties in elections, but even ruling parties need help to improve their ability to carry out their mandates.  

It is against this background that the Electoral Institute of Southern Africa (EISA) developed a programme aimed at strengthening political parties in the SADC region. This project is currently being implemented in Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland, and South Africa. It focuses on five key components: gender representation, intra- and inter-party democracy, outreach activities, conflict management, and party leadership. This paper presents a brief case study of the project activities in Botswana.

Intra- and Inter-party Democracy

Despite Botswana’s much acclaimed political stability, its parties have always faced the problem of establishing democratic practices that support cooperation both inside and between their organizations, i.e., intra- and inter-party democracy. Instead, its parties have suffered the impact of rampant factionalism. At independence in 1965, the two major parties were the Bechuanaland Democratic Party (BDP) and the Bechuanaland People’s Party (BPP). (These parties are now called the Botswana Democratic Party and the Botswana People’s Party.) Prior to the 1965 elections, the BPP divided into two factions, which diminished its electoral strength and thereby gave the BDP an edge (Somolekae 2002; Selolwane and Shale 2007). In 1966, dissatisfied with the BPP’s factionalism, some of its members formed the Botswana National Front (BNF), hoping it would unite the splinter groups. However, the BNF did not succeed and instead fragmented into at least seven different parties itself.

Even after these many splits, clearly Botswana’s politicians had learned no lessons about how to remedy intra-party conflicts. Over the years, they have not created any mechanisms that would allow them to circumvent party infighting. Such factionalism continues to be widely acknowledged as one of the major challenges of Botswana’s party politics.

The Mirage of Party Unity

Four decades after independence, the BDP remains comfortably in charge of the government, while the opposition has continued to fragment into smaller parties with trivial electoral impact (judging by the number of votes they received in the 2004 elections). Although part of the BDP’s dominance is attributable to Botswana’s use of the first-past–the post electoral model, this electoral system is not the only factor that makes it difficult for opposition parties to make any headway in the polls. In addition, a lack of party funding and the external regulatory framework equally affect the performance of parties.

Despite these realities, the Achilles heel of the opposition parties is their failure to cooperate and form coalitions. Had opposition parties done this in the past, they would have won some constituencies from the ruling party (judging by their combined 2004 election results). Instead, opposition parties have a history of reneging on alliance agreements on the eve of or immediately after elections. Examples include the 2004 pact between the Botswana Alliance Movement (BAM), BNF, and BPP and the 2005 memorandum of understanding signed by BAM, the Botswana Congress Party (BCP), BNF, and BPP. In both instances, the party leaders were not able to transcend their narrow self interests for the sake of broader party unity. (For a more detailed discussion of this issue, see Selolwane and Shale 2007).

Given this background of party and coalition disunity, EISA conducted a workshop for political parties in Botswana in December 2006 with the objective of providing a platform for parties to discuss issues of common interest. In addition, participants were encouraged to identify and prioritise their capacity-building needs related to the program’s five primary components: gender representation, intra-/inter-party democracy, outreach activities, conflict management, and party leadership. The following sections describe the main issues that arose during the political parties’ workshop discussions.

Diagnosing Challenges

The workshop identified a number of challenges facing Botswana’s political parties, the most important of which were (1) the complex historical role of political parties and (2) inadequate governance mechanisms. In Africa’s colonial history, parties often played one of two roles, either they were created as an instrument to transfer power from colonial regimes to the locals or they were organisations formed by locals to fight colonialism. However, once colonialism—the original reason for the parties’ creation—had ended, they came to be seen as impediments to “nation building and development” because they were seen to perpetuate ethnic differences by serving the interests of a single ethnic group rather than the interests of the country as a whole.

With respect to party governance, workshop participants agreed that political parties needed greater internal democracy in the election/selection of party leaders. Much intra-party conflict is the result of power struggles between leaders, which leads to party splits. They also suggested that parties need more clearly defined governance structures, with clear horizontal and vertical linkages. (These governance structures impact much of the party’s function, including how women and young people are represented within the party.) Participants also recognised a need for a membership database, which would let party members know how many rank-and-file members they have and help them conduct better outreach. In general, workshop attendees agreed unanimously that it was a lack of intra-party democracy that in turn created a lack of inter-party democracy.

Suggested Solutions

Political party representatives agreed that party members need to develop technical skills. These skills will be primarily developed through support and training in areas such as leadership, conflict management, fundraising, organisation/mobilisation, and negotiation (particularly with respect to forming alliances). Workshop participants also recommended solutions to the challenges described above. These proposed solutions are briefly discussed below:

Gender

Participants noted that gender inequality still exists within all party structures in Botswana. They therefore recommended that a training programme be developed on gender equality for both men and women.

Intra-party Democracy and Inter-party Relations

Participants recognised how intra- and inter-party conflict has impacted the country’s opposition parties. They therefore recommended that EISA assist parties in institutionalising party activities, developing a political education programme, and developing a code of conduct for parties.

Public Outreach

Participants indicated that outreach remains a challenge for parties. Therefore, they recommended that a training programme be developed that addressed (among other things) the design of effective mechanisms for recruitment and mobilisation. In addition, because electoral success often depends on the amount of preparatory work done between elections, participants asked EISA to help develop simple, user-friendly voter/civic education programmes for rank-and-file members across all parties.

Leadership

Participants acknowledged the lack of visionary leadership in political parties. While they indicated that in most cases leaders are born not made, they agreed that much could be done to improve a person’s inherent leadership skills. A person could learn through programmes on leadership skills, organisational management skills, project management skills, fundraising strategies, and capacity-building skills.

Conflict Management

Participants believed urgent attention should be paid to the conflict that has not only crippled parties but is threatening the country as a whole. They recommended that EISA develop a conflict management programme to help parties develop negotiation and mediation skills.

Conclusion

Overall, in uncovering Botswana’s political parties’ understanding of the challenges they face and the possible solutions available to them, the workshop was a success. It is quite likely that Botswana’s experience fairly closely resembles the experience of political parties throughout the region. In addition, these parties also face additional challenges, such as party funding and external legal frameworks, which were not a focus of this project but equally impact their political performance.

Victor Shale is a researcher at EISA.

References

Selolwane, O. and V. Shale. 2007. “Inter-party relations and sustainable democracy in Botswana.” Journal of African Elections. 5(2) “Special Issue on Botswana” (forthcoming).

Somolekae, G. 2002. “Botswana.” In T. Lodge, D. Kadima and D. Pottie. Compendium of Elections in Southern Africa. Johannesburg: Electoral Institute of Southern Africa.