Botswana’s much touted peaceful Presidential succession experienced uncertainty after the transition on 1 April 2019 as a result of former President Ian Khama’s public fallout with his ‘handpicked’ successor, President Mokgweetsi Masisi. Khama spearheaded a robust campaign to dislodge Masisi and the long-time ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) from power. He actively assisted in the formation of a new political party, the Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF). Khama also mobilized the country’s most populous Central District, the Bangwato tribal territory, of which he is kgosi (paramount chief), for the hotly contested 2019 general elections. Two perspectives emerged on Khama’s approach, which was labeled loosely as ‘tribalism’. One school of thought was that the Westernised and bi-racial Khama was not socialized sufficiently into Tswana culture and tribal life to be a tribalist. Therefore, he was said to be using cunningly a colonial-style strategy of divide-and-rule to achieve his agenda. The second school of thought opined that Khama was a ‘shameless tribalist’ hell-bent on stoking ‘tribalism’ among the ‘Bangwato’ in order to bring Masisi’s government to its knees. This article, however, observes that Khama’s approach was not entirely new in Botswana’s politics, but only bigger in scale, and instigated by a paramount chief and former President. Since Botswana’s independence in 1966, ‘tribalism’ has invariably been used by individual politicians as a short-term political strategy, but hardly paid dividends. Therefore, Khama’s case in 2019 was no exception despite enlisting the support of his influential South African acquaintances and business moguls.

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