President Festus Mogae: The Regent Who Became King

Abstract

The watershed moment came on 4 November 1995. By the time delegates made their way back home, it was all over. In an extraordinary year, the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) had met twice in congress. Four months earlier, in July, the faithful had descended on the dormitory village of Mogoditshane for another bout of factional bloodletting. The congress came two years after Kanye, at which the polarity in the ruling party had reached crisis level. This particular congress came in the wake of the gravest crisis the party had ever faced.