01 Dec 2016

Parliament was in a sombre mood on Tuesday as legislators observed a moment of silence to honour the death of their colleague, MP for Tlokweng, Ms Same Bathobakae.

Speaker of the National Assembly, Ms Gladys Kokorwe relayed the message of Ms Bathobakae’s death to members of the National Assembly, some of whom  could not hold their tears.

“As you might have heard by now due to the loss of respect our people have lost in announcing deaths, indeed, our colleague Mme Mma Bathobakae o re tlogetse,” she said.

Fondly known as Kwankwetla by those in the political circles, Ms Bathobakae is no more.

She was found motionless in her home in Tlokweng on Monday 28, and was pronounced dead upon arrival at the hospital.

“It is with an extreme sense of loss and grief that we are mourning the passing away of my close friend and colleague, Tlokweng MP, Same Bathobakae,’’ said Mahalapye East MP, Ms Botlogile Tshireletso.

Ms Tshireletso who is also the Parliamentary Caucus on Women chairperson said her unique brilliance, humour and charm endeared herself to all her colleagues from both isles in Parliament, from all generation and all walks of life.

She said she became close to Ms Bathobakae after the 2014 general elections during their swearing in as parliamentarians and their friendship even extended to family members.

Ms Tshireletso said they shared a wide range of life issues and surprisingly, politics was hardly a topic they discussed, unless it had to do with a female political representative.

She said ‘B-Girl’ as she affectionately called her, was like a sister to her especially that the two of them rose to Parliament from humble beginnings.

She further said they were at some point appointed council chairpersons and she got to know much about her when she was still a councillor and later as an assistant minister in local government.

“Mostly we spoke about fashionable clothing because as you know even our body postures are almost the same.

 I was slowly introducing her to fashion of stylish hats,” she said.

Ms Tshireletso regrettably shared that at the time of her death, Ms Bathobakae had already designed and tailored an outfit for the State-Of-Nation addressed scheduled for December 5.

She also shared that Ms Bathobakae was very passionate about issues that affect women in general and spoke passionately about raising a girl child and that she was not afraid to take men head-on.

On Monday afternoon Ms Tshireletso issued a statement on this year’s 16-Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence and she raised a hot potato topic of ‘’blessers’’ when she said she realised that Ms Bathobakae was missing in Parliament.

“When I raised my eyes, I only realised that she was missing in Parliament because I know she would have nodded and supported at what I was saying because she was very passionate on these issues,” said Ms Tshireletso emotionally.

She said “In the Parliament buildings she enjoyed throwing tantrums and was very comfortable joking with Honourable Shaw Kgathi, MP for Bobonong, I mean from our BDP side.” Sefhare-Ramokgonami MP, Ms Dorcus Makgato described her as one of the MPs who was calm and collected and worked well with her colleagues.

‘In our Women Parliamentary Forum, Mma-Bathobakae was a very sweet, sensitive, kind woman and not too loud a person, even if she was to differ in opinion with her colleagues,” she said.

She said Ms Bathobakae was one of the few MPs who, one would never thought was from the opposition during the time they had traveled on foreign trips representing the country with colleagues from the Botswana Democratic Party.

Ms Makgato said when there was commotion in Parliament, they relied on her to calm her colleagues from the opposition isle.

Ms Bathobakae was born on July 2, 1956 and was a member of the Botswana National Front, the party currently under the Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC) formation.

She made history by becoming the first opposition woman to enter Parliament through general elections after the BCP’s Dr Habudi Hubona first became the first opposition woman to be voted through a bye election after the passing on of Mr Tshelang Masisi of Francistown West Constituency.

She rose through the party ranks and was once a BNF’s vice president and Women’s League secretary general.

Ms Bathobakae was a former Tlokweng South Councillor and was once a chairperson for South East District Council.

In the floor of Parliamentary debates, she will be remembered for advocating for the rights of women and speaking against under-representation of women in political and decision making spheres which excluded  them from benefiting equally as their male counterparts.

She was of the view that the process of governance should be inclusive and participatory so that women should be able to have the opportunity to influence the institutions and policies that affect their lives as most of them head households.

She was passionate about the plight of Batlokwa community’s access to land and that government should find a way of protecting Batlokwa cattle from migrating across the border due to not well thought of barricades. ENDS