07 Dec 2015

Former Vice President Dr Ponatshego Kedikilwe says there is enough reason to celebrate and not mourn the death of founding executive chairperson of Botswana Telecommunications Authority (BTA) now BOCRA, Mr Cuthbert Moses Lekaukau who was buried in Phakalane, Gaborone on Saturday December 5.

Addressing hundreds of mourners who came from across the country and neighbouring South Africa and Namibia, Dr Kedikilwe said Botswana was fortunate enough to have had people of Mr Lekaukau’s calibre who did not tire from serving the country selflessly.

The late Lekaukau passed on, November 27, 2015 at a hospital in South African. Dr Kedikilwe, who has worked with Mr Lekaukau said instead of mourning, the people should hold on tight to their Christian beliefs and remain resolute because Mr Lekaukau has devotedly played his earthly assignment in many capacities.  

He said the late Lekaukau, whom he called Mos Mos during their yester years in the public service, was a man of sober habits and workaholic, who was committed to shaping the civil service at the time when resources were limited.

Though Dr Kedikilwe is senior to Lekaukau, he said he is happy to be associated with the Hukuntsi born father of three children whom together lived and tasted both analogue and digital eras.

Another speaker, former permanent secretary, who was also a neighbour to the deceased, Mr Elvidge Mhlauli who worked with him while they were both permanent secretaries said Lekaukau was a perfectionist who was not easily moved from what he believed in.  

He said Mr Lekaukau was also fond of consulting his close neighbours on social issues in Extension 9 as he believed that no man is an island, noting that he was a glowing wood block and also a fountain of hope among many people.

“This man was very brilliant and always strived for excellence but above all he was brave and skillful,” he said. Meanwhile, Kgosi Victor Suping of Supingstaad in South Africa paid tribute to Mr Lekaukau for having united the Bahurutshe of Botswana, Namibia and South Africa, noting that his quest to establish and compile genealogies of Bahurutshe families and clans in these countries should be accomplished.

Kgosi Suping said through the late Lekaukau many were able to realise that they have an extended family tree with long roots thus he formed what is today known as Ipatlise o ikitse.  

Though Mr Lekaukau was a staunch member of Roman Catholic, he did not spare the rod as he applied it whenever there was a need, something which his second born child Mothusi attested to but blamed his elder brother, Moatlhodi whom he said was the one who always put him in trouble.

Lekaukau was born on March 4, 1944 in Hukuntsi and attended school between 1950 and 1957. He later did his secondary education before embarking on tertiary education and graduated as a lawyer.

He was a founding member of Communications Regulatory Association of Southern Africa and also chaired the committee that drafted the current Commonwealth Telecommunication Organisation constitution. ENDS