GOVERNMENT OF BOTSWANA DISMISSES BIZARRE AND ABSURD CLAIMS CONTAINED IN SO-CALLED ‘INTELLIGENCE’ REPORT This is to confirm that the Government of Botswana has been aware of a document, referred to by some as a “Ground Source Report”, which has been circulating for some time now as a public document, following its exposure in South Africa in what is alleged to be a political dirty tricks campaign designed to discredit individuals there and elsewhere in the region. Further to the above we note that the said same report with its truly bizarre claims that the “National Endowment of Democracy,” a US based NGO [ned.org], in cahoots with the “World Movement for Democracy [wmd.org], is somehow micro-managing this region’s politics has been treated with derision by mainstream media within South Africa, as well as commentators from across the political spectrum. The said report’s nonsensical allegations about H.E. the President and other individuals and institutions in Botswana, should be understood in this wider regional context. Further to the above we would observe the following: Given that the President studied at the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst during the early 1970s, and only became President in 2008, one wonders why anyone would wish dignify a so-called intelligence report that in its crude ignorance claims that 10 to 15 years after said training he became President? Given that it is a simple fact that individuals such as Tshekedi Khama and Mokgweetsi Masisi were never employed in the military or security establishments of this or any other country, one wonders why anyone would wish to escalate bizarre and slanderous claims to the contrary? Given that local reporters and others have been repeatedly briefed and taken on tours of Thebepatswa, one wonders why claims of it being an America base should still be taken seriously? Given that the locations of the CIA headquarters and the National Endowment for Democracy are a matter of public record and otherwise viewable on websites such as Google Earth, one wonders why anyone not prone to paranoid delusions would take seriously a report that states that they are housed under one roof, much less that the President flew in and out of Langley, where there is in fact no airstrip? Given that DeBeers only reached a legal settlement with USA anti-trust claimants in 2008, which was finally upheld by the US Supreme Court in 2012, or that local shareholdings and ownership are a matter of public record, one wonder what could be the basis for reporting that Americans dominate the Botswana economy, beyond their role as leading consumers of diamonds? But, perhaps more to the point we would ask why anyone would would wish to take such an obvious example of disinformation seriously, more so that the very existence of the same report was in fact publicly exposed by one of its principal targets, Mr. Zwelinzima Vavi, who has himself now called for its origins to be thoroughly investigated. As the Government of Botswana we too will look forward with interest to the outcome of such an inquiry, should it take place.
Posted on: Mon, 26 Aug 2013 09:24:44 +0000
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