The 2024 Elections in Botswana: Introduction to the Special Issue

Abstract

On 30 October 2024, Batswana voted in the country’s thirteenth parliamentary and district council elections since Independence in 1966. The result was the unprecedented defeat of the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP), which had governed Botswana since before Independence, and the formation of a new government by the hitherto opposition Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC). The BDP was not merely defeated but was also crushed, with its share of the vote dropping by more than twenty percentage points in comparison to the previous elections, in 2019. The BDP won only four (out of 61) parliamentary seats and 130 (out of 609) district council seats. It was relegated from being the ruling party to being the smallest of the opposition parties in Parliament. It also lost its control over local government. Before the elections, it controlled almost all of the 31 local councils. After the elections, it controlled only one (very small) council (Chobe).