- DC allegedly angered by the sidelining of its supporters in the recruitment of police trainees
Pascalinah Kabi
THE country’s main coalition partners, the All Basotho Convention (ABC) and the Democratic Congress (DC) are said to be at each other’s throats again. This time over the recruitment of trainee police officers.
Authoritative DC sources, who spoke to this publication on condition of anonymity because they are not authorised to address the media on party issues, this week told this publication that their party was angered by its coalition partner’s decision to sideline its supporters in the recruitment of trainee police officers.
The Lesotho Mounted Police Service (LMPS) falls under the ABC-controlled Ministry of Police and Public Safety, which is headed by the ABC’s legislator for Thaba-Tseka, ‘Mamoipone Senauoane. It recently recruited 200 trainee police officers who began training at the Police Training Centre (PTC) a fortnight ago.
Posts in the police service and other government institutions are often filled along partisan lines and the party in charge of a ministry usually recruits its own supporters. Instead of recruiting deserving candidates, the governing parties use the posts to reward loyal supporters and retain patronage ahead of elections.
But Deputy Prime Minister Mathibeli Mokhothu’s DC is said to be unhappy that Prime Minister Moeketsi Majoro’s ABC completely sidelined its supporters when recruiting the trainee officers. According to the DC sources, the DC had hoped that the ABC would reciprocate its “kind gesture” after the DC-controlled Home Affairs ministry reserved some posts for ABC members when it conducted its own recruitment exercise late last year. DC deputy leader, Motlalentoa Letsosa, is the Home Affairs minister.
The DC believes the failure to reserve some posts for its supporters merely points to the “arrogance” of its bigger coalition partner “which has been observable even in the recruitment of staffers in other ministries controlled by the ABC”.
DC secretary general Tsitso Cheba said yesterday he was not in a position to comment on the issue at this juncture. He promised to comment at an appropriate time.
On his part, ABC spokesperson ‘Montoeli Masoetsa said although the ABC’s NEC had negotiated the coalition agreement with the DC, it was not in any way involved in the recruitment of police officers.
“The ABC did not have any part to play in the recruitment process,” Mr Masoetsa said.
“The party leadership was never informed about the job police recruitment process, we heard like anyone else when it was publicly announced by the police authorities.
“Maybe the minister (Senauoane) who is an ABC member was involved. Maybe other ABC members were involved but as the NEC, we were not involved. I am not even trying to deny that some ABC members may have been involved because I have heard reports that 19 recruits are from Thaba-Tseka — the home district of the minister of police.
“We also heard from very reliable sources that there are some people who used their influence to have their relatives recruited into the police service,” Mr Masoetsa added.
He said in any event, the ABC’s NEC was not supposed to play any part in the recruitment because “we believe that the police force must be depoliticised”.
Despite DC secretary general Cheba’s reluctance to comment and the ABC’s NEC washing its hands off the matter, some members of the DC’s NEC insisted that the party was not happy with the ABC.
“The DC is not happy with the ABC which has shown that it is unwilling to share with us posts in the ministries it controls as a sign of camaraderie among coalition partners.
“It is not only in the police service where we are unhappy with the ABC’s behaviour. Even in the ministries of health and of social development, our partner excluded our deployed cadres in the recruitment exercise. Yet when it came to the ministries that we control such as Home Affairs, the ABC secured employment for its members,” the DC’s NEC member said.
Another DC NEC member concurred saying, “the DC was never approached or allocated posts in the police service”.
He said they were conducting their own investigations to ascertain if the recruitment exercise had been above board “as claimed by the police commissioner (Holomo Molibeli) and the minister of police”.
Although the DC is unhappy with the ABC, the sources said the party was not contemplating to pull out of the coalition as there was just a year to go before the 2022 elections. Just like in previous cases where the two parties have clashed over several issues including the DC’s claims that the ABC was out to tarnish its leaders’ image through “false accusations” of their involvement in human trafficking activities, the DC members said they would not do anything except register their concerns when the two parties’ NECs hold their next joint meeting on a date that is yet to be agreed.
Recruitments to government posts have always been a bone of contention with reports of partisanship, nepotism dominating the exercise.
Back in 2017, opposition Alliance of Democrats (AD) leader Monyane Moleleki set the cat among the pigeons with his sensational claims that during his time as police minister, they had corruptly recruited their own supporters.
Mr Moleleki alleged that he participated in the recruitment of 250 party supporters of his former DC party and its coalition partners, namely the Lesotho Congress for Democracy, Lesotho People’s Congress, Popular Front for Democracy, Basotho Congress Party, National Independent Party and the Marematlou Freedom Party.
“I am one of the people within (the-then) government that made 22 000 young men and women of this country to wait for long hours in the sun with hope they would get jobs when we knew we already had our people listed for the police jobs,” Mr Moleleki said shortly after breaking away to form the AD.
His claims were rejected by the former regime.
More recently, the recruitment of police officers has been criticised by the Lesotho Mounted Police Service Staff Association (LEPOSA). A fortnight ago, LEPOSA spokesperson Police Constable (PC) Motlatsi Mofokeng described the recruitment exercise as “bogus,” saying the association had received reports that most of the recruits did not even possess the required qualifications as some of them had not even completed high school education. He said others did not even write the police’s entrance examination.
“There are processes which have to be followed to ensure that all those who are enrolled are fully deserving of that honour and they will surely serve and protect the nation in line with the mandate of the LMPS.
“The failure to vet these new recruits is likely to bring us a bitter harvest. It is worrisome to think what the future of the LMPS will be like as we have been reliably informed that vetting and even medical tests were not conducted ahead of the recruitment of some of the trainees.
We have also discovered that most of the recruits are related to some senior police officers and have therefore been given an unfair advantage over other candidates who don’t have any connections,” PC Mofokeng said.
This year’s recruitment exercise has also been marred by the tragic deaths of four recruits who perished while undergoing training a fortnight ago. The causes of their deaths are yet to be revealed although there has been speculation that they succumbed to the rigorous training exercises which their fragile state of health could not withstand.
The post ABC, DC in new fight appeared first on Lesotho Times.