The previous administrations of Botswana Sectors of Educators Trade Union (BOSETU) has been accused of maladministration and abuse of office. This was said by the Mpho Maruping led lobby.
Mpho Maruping leads a team which will contest for BOSETU Executive Committee elections at the Union’s Congress scheduled for the end of April. The Maruping led lobby is contesting against the incumbent lobby led by Winston Radikolo.
The Maruping led lobby says they are bringing restoration of hope and dignity to the members of BOSETU which have since been lost due to maladministration, abuse of office, and political affiliation. According to the lobby group, there has been maladministration in the Executive Committee. The group says the previous leadership has misused Union funds, failed to come up with ways to generate sustainable income for the Union and failed to account. They mentioned the previous commitee’s failure to develop and utilize their allocated plots, to tackle cases of funds misuse, and failure to properly handle the pension saga.
“The union has acquired no less than 4 plots over the years. These plots have remained undeveloped for years and one of the congress resolutions was that they must be developed so that they can start generating income for the union. BOSETU lost millions of pula to bogus investments (mobile and logistics companies) to name a few. This has compromised the welfare of the union members as well as union financial position and sustainability. The 2017 Congress was very clear that there is a need to carry out a Forensic Audit from 2008 t0 2018, covering the Business Wing surprisingly it only covered about 3 years with focus mainly on the Executive Secretary, the Treasurer, and some employees. We are seriously concerned that during the Pension Fund saga, which dragged for some time and widely reported on local and international, especially when there was financial misconduct at BPOPF, those who sit in the board generally remained silent, even though this presented a bleak future for our members, that their pension money was being misappropriated. They failed their fiduciary role of taking care of member’s pension” the lobby group indicated.
The lobby group, which calls itself ‘Team Restoration’ furthers said that they are against the political affiliation which is being perpetuated by some of their opponents. According to Team Restoration, the Union should remain independent as their constitution stipulates. They are of the view that aligning to political parties is divisive.
“We would like to pledge to union members that we are non – partisan. However, we understand some of our comrades contesting for various leadership positions have aligned themselves politically. This is hazardous and has the potential to divide our members. We are not affiliated to any political party and we are ready to have our individual political affiliation investigated. We challenge the other team to do the same. We believe our members should be allowed to affiliate with any political formation in the country, as the constitution of the country states and this being a strong pillar of our democracy. We are talking about the freedom to associate. Our own constitution is also founded on the non-partisan principle as we appreciate that our membership is made up of.” the team asserted.
