Botswana’s president, advocate Duma Boko, has ordered his government to issue an apology to powerful businesswoman Bridgette Motsepe over “false and reckless” allegations she had engaged in money laundering and terrorism financing.
In a statement this weekend, the Botswana government apologised to Motsepe and slammed the claims first made in 2019 by Jako Hubona, a senior official in one of that country’s law enforcement agencies. The statement said Hubona had also impaired the dignity of former Botswana president Seretse Khama Ian Khama, who was once exiled in South Africa.
At the time, Motsepe and Khama were accused of plotting to overthrow former Botswana president Mokgweetsi Masisi. The statement said that such “fabrications” would never occur again on Boko’s watch.
The apology to Motsepe, a version of which was first issued in July last year, is carried in full in Business Times today (see Business Times, page 5).
It comes amid reports that Motsepe is seeking payment of legal fees of R83m from the Botswana government. Her lawyers, the law firm Webber Wentzel, had also complained to the Botswana government that it is “in contempt” of a court order handed down by the Lobatse high court, and that Motsepe “will be taking legal advice on the next steps”. Webber Wentzel said there had been no “substantive explanation” for its failure to comply with the payment obligations.
The law firm also complained about how long Botswana’s government had taken to run advertisements expressing an apology in South African print and broadcast media and in the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times and CNN in terms of a court order made on June 27 last year.
The allegations against Motsepe were made more than six years ago by Hubona, then an investigator working for Botswana’s Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime, in an affidavit handed to that country’s high court. The claims were reported internationally.
The allegations made by Mr Hubona against Ambassador Motsepe and supported by the government bodies he mentions are entirely false and were made recklessly.
“The allegations made by Mr Hubona against Ambassador Motsepe and supported by the government bodies he mentions are entirely false and were made recklessly,” the Botswana government said. “The allegations also impugned others, including Wilhelmina Maswabi, former president Seretse Khama Ian Khama, and the late Isaac Kgosi, as well as a number of financial institutions and the South African Reserve Bank.”
Maswabi, codenamed “Butterfly”, was arrested and charged in a protracted legal battle that ended in 2021, when South African advocate Gerrie Nel of AfriForum advised Gaborone’s prosecutors to drop the charges against her owing to lack of evidence.
“The government of Botswana, the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime, the Directorate of Intelligence and Security Services, and Mr Hubona unconditionally retract the allegations and apologise to Ambassador Motsepe for making them.
“The new human rights-based government of Botswana, under the leadership of advocate Duma Boko, reaffirms its commitment to the rule of law and assures the public that fabrications [such as those that] occurred in this matter will never reoccur.”
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