Dear Cabinet and Congress members
WHEN Ghanaian writer Ayi Kwei Armah wrote his novel The Beautiful Ones Are Not Yet Born he was not talking about opposition parties but the pure and incorruptible generation that was yet to come.
Yet that doesn’t stop me, comrades, from bastardising the title of his novel for my instalment this week.
The person who will run an opposition political party that will take over from our congress party is not yet born.
That leader is still not even a spirit or at least an idea.
The people who will give birth to that leader are yet to “know each other”.
They are probably not born yet as well.
I say this with a strong conviction because I have thoroughly looked at the calibre of the opposition politicians we have and concluded that they are hopeless competitors.
So disorganised are they that they will need a few generations to put up a decent fight against our congress movement.
Look around you, comrades.
There is the All Basotho Convention (ABC), a coalition of bitter congress members and nationalists, run by an old political talking head who is yet to make up his mind whether he is a congressman or a nationalist.
No wonder they call it a “convention”.
It’s a convention of turncoats, the confused and the hypocrites who have fooled themselves into believing that they can ride on the wave of anger of the urbanites who hate the congress movement with a passion.
But there is always a danger when you bring Pentecostals, Catholics and Evangelists in one church.
The party is barely four years old but it is already torn apart by dirty power struggles.
It has neither the vision nor the strategy to defeat our congress movement. Never mind that our own congress is a bit frail at the moment.
The ABC has neither the cohesion nor the common-purpose to become the next government.
Predicting the demise of the ABC has become as easy as reciting the alphabet.
Its leader is 72 and the chairman, the man whom they say is being groomed to take over, is an unmitigated clown who cannot tell the difference between a forest and a bush.
Then you have the Basotho National Party, a political gathering of people who have remained trapped in their antiquated ways.
It’s a party that has consistently refused to let go of its checkered history.
The world has dramatically changed while they are still muttering how good they had it under Leabua Jonathan.
I need not remind you that this is a party headed by a former army general who thinks that dissenting voices are a sign of insurrection. Then you have the Basutoland Congress Party which has remained a shell of its former self since proper people like us left it enmass in 1997 to form the LCD.
It’s amazing that there are still some people with brains between their ears who are still affiliated to it.
That it still has a handful of supporters is surprising.
The fact that it even exists is shocking.
Then you have the Lesotho Workers Party, that party which pretends to be labour-based in a country where there are more herdboys than workers.
Until its marriage to the ABC three years ago that party was virtually unknown even to the most overworked and downtrodden of the 35 000 or so textile workers.
Its recent abrupt and acrimonious divorce from the ABC only makes its prospects of sinking into political oblivion more imminent.
Did I leave out contenders?
Well, perhaps Senkatana and Marematlou Freedom Party deserve a mention not because they are worth it but because the leaders seem to have put so much effort in misnaming their parties that avoiding mentioning them will be a disservice.
We also have jokes like ACP, BBDP, CPL, HBP, KBP, LPC, NPP, NLFP, SDU, UP and SDP.
With opposition parties like these who needs a one party state?
Comrades, I am convinced beyond any shred of doubt that with such jokes for opposition parties the biggest opposition to the LCD is the LCD.
It’s our actions alone and not the prowess of the opposition parties that can take the LCD out of power.
Indeed the beautiful ones are not yet born.
Comments are closed.