21 Sep 2015

Office of the President (OP) has quelled rumours that President Lt Gen. Seretse Khama Ian Khama wants to amend the Constitution so as to serve a third term.

“This office wishes to state for the record that President Khama has on numerous occasions indicated that he is on his last term of office,” said a statement that OP released yesterday.

The release stated that the President had expressed his views about such fundamentals of democracy, especially in light of developments in this regard in the continent and elsewhere, the last such announcement being during the 35^th Ordinary Session of the SADC Heads of State meetings press briefing.

The statement followed allegations by some newspapers that had been spreading rumours to the effect that President Khama wanted to amend the Constitution.

“ We feel very strongly that this is yet another mischievous attempt to taint the good name of the President by printing stories that are deliberately false”, the statement stated.

The statement said it was disturbing that such insinuations and attacks on the President came at a time when there was an announcement that Mauritius, Botswana and Namibia were number 1 in the African continent in terms of citizens positive assessment on their democracies and issues of good governance by the Afro Barometer.

The OP expressed worry that the allegations came at a time when there was concern about the conduct of some members of the judiciary.

Interestingly, the release stated, the insinuations were being pursued by those who were well known for such wayward behavior within the media fraternity.

“ We are hopeful that these are not unscrupulous tendencies by those in the media to divert attention from the real issues. It will indeed be a shame is such tendencies are pursued over real issues”. ENDS