Moorosi Tsiane
ALLIANCE for Democrats (AD) senator Rethabile Marumo has resigned from her post as the Deputy minister of Gender and Youth, Sport and Recreation.
In so doing, Ms Marumo joined a growing list of ministers, deputy ministers and other senior government officials who have resigned from their posts just two years into the five tenure of the four-party coalition government that is headed by All Basotho Convention (ABC) leader, Thomas Thabane.
Ms Marumo confirmed her resignation to the Sunday Express in an interview on Friday.
She hinted that she could have resigned due to plans by her principals to redeploy her to a diplomatic post. She however hinted that her resignation could have been at the instigation of her principals.
“I am a public servant and as a public servant we work on a given mandate and if my principals think I have done enough then that is it,” Ms Marumo said.
“Our mandate is to serve the nation and if our superiors feel that one can do better somewhere else then the changes will be made. And we will have to accept that and take up those new responsibilities. We have to respect the decision of our principals who in this case are the government leaders, namely the Prime Minister (Dr Thabane), Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Monyane Moleleki of the AD) and their coalition partners (Thesele Maseribane of the Basotho National Party and Keketso Rantšo of the Reformed Congress of Lesotho.
“We don’t choose where we want to work because such decisions lie solely with our principals. On the issue of me going to work at the embassies, I will have an answer after meeting with my leaders to map the way forward.
“It is something that can happen but I can’t really get into it now. The government spokesperson has also said that that may happen but we all have to wait until everything is confirmed.”
Others who have recently left their posts are Ambassador Nkopane Monyane the former Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Police and Public Safety and his Tourism, Environment and Culture counterpart, Monaphathi Maraka.
Mr Monyane resigned ahead of being deployed as the country’s ambassador to the United Nations in New York.
Mr Maraka confirmed that he was leaving the tourism ministry for a foreign destination. He however, said it was premature to say where he was headed to as the matter was still to be finalised with Mr Mphaka.
Last year there were some resignations from government including those of former Defence and National Security Minister, Sentje Lebona, on 13 September and former Minister of Forestry and Land Reclamation, ‘Mamotsie Motsie, on 22 August.