Botswana collects M52 billion in taxes

Before I start, I have a short story to share, as a follow-up to last week’s opinion piece. I was in Pretoria last Tuesday and decided to take my car for a wash at one filling station in Lynwood. As I was paying for the service at one of the cashiers I over-heard one security guard throwing tantrums over how Pitso Mosimane (former Mamelodi Sundowns coach) discredited them as Sundowns FC supporters. He went on and on and said, “Pitso o re tloaela hampe.” So I thought I should join in the conversation because I personally didn’t like how Pitso Mosimane was ill-treated by his own people on his home ground. So, I kindly asked Mr Security guard a very simple question and said, “Pitso o le tloaela hampe ha a etsa eng?” Well, I seem to have asked the most difficult question ever because there was no clear answer. The only words that came out of the mouth were, “Daai-maan o re tloaela hampe.” Even though the conversation made us all laugh because of the intense emotions the security guard displayed, it cemented what I wrote about in last week’s piece: Black people don’t love one another. Some people even go as far as saying that, “an enemy of a black man is another black man”. What happened to Pitso Mosimane was just a blatant display of self-hate that harbours within us. We are consumed by hatred towards each other and ourselves hence our lack of progress. On the contrary, there’s a nation of African people that loves itself and seems to be progressing by leaps and bounds. Whilst we are busy playing monkey games by registering one million political parties and trying to topple each other, the Botswana Unified Revenue Services (BURS) managed to collect a staggering P40 Billion in tax revenue, in the year 2020/2021. 40 Billlion Pula that translates to M52 Billion. Let us all remember that the Lesotho Revenue Authority (LRA), only managed to collect M6.3 Billion Maloti in domestic tax revenue for the year 2020/2021. From these figures, we can easily conclude that Botswana has an economy that is ten times the size of Lesotho. Ten times bigger! Whilst we are busy playing monkey games. Ka nnete, Lesotho has been reduced to a circus by his own people. I read an interview in one of the local newspapers where one media personality in Lesotho vowed to be the next prime-minister in the coming 2022 elections. She said, she sees herself as the first female Prime minister in Lesotho. Hahahaha! What a joke! I mean how many political parties do we have at the moment? 36/37? And I understand that there are eighteen (18) parties on the waiting list to be registered with the IEC to make a total of 54/55? After all this madness we expect to have a stable democracy with 55 parties on a voters-roll? Guys! Let’s be serious for a change. You know, the fact that Spur Restaurant failed in Lesotho should’ve shocked us. It should’ve been an eye opener for us to realise that we don’t have an economy. How can a country/economy fail to sustain one (1) Spur restaurant? One! But a thing as big as that one doesn’t shock us anymore. Most importantly, there was no media statement from the Ministry of Trade of Industry regarding the closure of Spur. My feeling is that the Ministry of Trade and Industry should have placed the Spur restaurant under business rescue in order to save the franchise, jobs and reputation of the country. As things stand, it might take another 100 years to get another Spur restaurant in Maseru or Lesotho for that matter. As a property developer, I know the struggle it takes to get franchises that once failed in Lesotho. I am referring to the likes of Nandos, Chicken-Licken, Ocean Basket, VW/Audi, Mercedes-Benz, Isuzu, Land-Rover/Range-Rover, Ford and Spar supermarkets (Spar Group). On the contrary, all of the companies I’ve just mentioned are all thriving in Botswana. However, reason that the companies are reluctant to return to Lesotho is that, once bitten, twice shy. Meaning, there’s simply no economy or business-case to support the businesses. Which in-fact may be true to a certain extent. There is resonance to the fact that our economy is battered despite the impact of Covid-19. The problem with all these things is that nothing shocks us anymore. Se re shoele matsoalo. In conclusion, do you know of a country named Zimbabwe? It was once a thriving country that was the envy of most African countries. Unfortunately, some of its people never thought Zimbabwe could ever fail. They became complacent and started to implement questionable policies like the land-expropriation policy. This was in the early 2000s and I remember it like it was yesterday. The whole world warned Zimbabwe against land expropriation but failure just sounded impossible. What eventually happened to Zimbabwe? The inevitable happened and the economy collapsed to its knees. That was the first time I’ve ever heard of a term named hyperinflation. A sad reality indeed and my fear is that this might just happen to Lesotho and its people. Lesotho’s economy may collapse to nothing if it’s not already there, considering the high levels of unemployment. One thing I’ve realised is that we’ll write opinion pieces, week-in, week-out until our faces turn blue. If there’s no will to steer the country in the right direction, nothing will ever change. The national reforms will just go to waste. As I said, nothing shocks us anymore. We’d rather lower the bar so that we can achieve menial results such as collecting tax revenue of 6.3 Billion and then celebrate. That’s why one gentleman named Ntate Stebo once remarked that Basotho athletes rarely compete in high-jump at the Olympic games. Do you know why? That’s because, Basotho people always set the bar too low. So it wouldn’t make sense to compete in a game that needs athletes to constantly raise the bar. ‘Mako Bohloa