Shao resigns from SR

MASERU – EMBATTLED Socialist Revolutionaries (SR) spokesman, Thabo Shao, has resigned from the party a week after leader Teboho Mojapela suspended him from the executive committee.
Shao, who was contesting for the position of deputy leader, has in his resignation letter accused Mojapela of “autocratic leadership”.

The resignation comes as the party is preparing for an elective conference next month amid charges by Shao that “Mojapela (was) creating means to field his cronies in the national executive committee”.

Shao had fiercely opposed the drafting of Tlohelang Aumane and Tjoetsane Seoka into the executive committee arguing the two had not served the mandatory 36 months in the party to qualify for higher office.

The party’s constitution stipulates that members can only enter the leadership race if they have been members of the party for 36 or more months.

Aumane and Seoka defected from the Alliance of Democrats (AD) only last year ahead of last October’s election.

Shao’s defiance set him on a collision course with Mojapela who later accused him of envying Aumane and Seoka because “they are educated”.

In his resignation letter, Shao said Mojapela had failed to demonstrate exemplary leadership skills in the administration of the party.

Shao said he had made numerous demands for minutes of resolutions of the national executive committee but Mojapela failed dismally to give him the minutes.

“This is a sure sign that he has unilaterally fired me,” he said.

“I have made a firm decision to leave the party.”

Asked about his next move, Shao said he is not going to back-off in politics and he will continue to serve the nation.

He said he joined politics to work for the Basotho nation as a whole and he is going to continue with his journey in politics.

“I am still at an age where I can continue to serve Basotho,” Shao said.

He said he is not going to rest until every Mosotho’s right to have a job is met and fulfilled.

He said he is determined to see youths being employed and being placed on a trajectory to change their lives for the better.

His longstanding goal is to see corruption and all forms of crime being eradicated.

Shao said he is not going to join any political party as yet but some parties were already making advances to co-opt him.

He declined to disclose the parties that were trying to woo him.

Shao said he became part of the SR hoping it would rule this country and prioritise issues of development.

In the long run, he said, he only found out that the party was crippled by poor leadership and had low morale.

Shao is the second senior SR member to quit the party. Nkhetše Monyalotsa who was the party’s deputy leader also quit the party last year after he also fell out with Mojapela.

Monyalotsa defected to the Basotho Action Party (BAP) led by Professor Nqosa Mahao in February last year.

Shao’s resignation comes after Mojapela asked him to ‘show cause why’ he could not be suspended from the party’s committee.

Staff Reporters