Key Qoutes
Young people constitute at least 60 percent of the African population, and if we fail to invest in them now and capacitate them with hard but also soft skills in school, we will miss certain opportunities.
– Kahisano Kolobe
If one side is still sick, it affects the other to a certain extent. I want to believe that if we move together towards the same change, we can achieve much more.
– Kahisano Kolobe
Why democracy work and democracy development is essential, especially in Lesotho?
Lesotho is a democratic country and has been a multi-party system for the longest time in southern Africa. For the nation, being guided by democratic pillars and objectives is important. Citizens need to be involved and be recognised not only by politicians during elections because we continuously need to hold each other accountable. It is a two-way street. If the voters do not hold the government accountable regarding its pillars, it would mean that the government, to a certain extent, does not deliver on its pillars, including issues of transparency or inclusiveness. In Lesotho, there is that gap because one of the others is not playing their part, so the democracy development part is essential here to close the gap.
When the country goes to elections, it will be interesting to see the voter turnout because we are going through reforms and harmonising laws to ensure democracy and justice work. Secondly, it is the first time in Lesotho that elections will be held at the scheduled time. In the past five years, we held three elections within five years. But now, for the first time, we held elections as dated and also had some fresh air of coalition governments. So it is very interesting to see how the country will manage our next coalition government, and is there something we have learned from the past, or will we repeat the same mistakes we have made?
You just mentioned the upcoming elections, meaning that 65 parties are up for election. Can you tell us more about the party system and everyday practice?
Our party system is interesting. The Laws of Lerotholi still govern us. Thus, parties are registered under the Societies Act from 1986, which means that parties are registered where NGOs or other CSOs are registered. Creating a party requires a maximum of R200 ZAR and ten people. After that, they seek a filiation with the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) to be endorsed and if you have 500 signatures, you are regarded as a political party. You see, it is very easy to establish a party here, but for me it is also democratic and flexible.
Our party system is a constitutional monarchy; we have a King, a Parliament and a Senate. The king is advised by the ministry, so he does not have influence hence he is ceremonial. The Senate is the representation of our principle chiefs and we have representatives elected by the Prime Ministers. The Parliament consists of 120 members who are elected in terms of a mixed member proportional electoral system. 80 members were elected under the first-past the post system and the remaining 40 seats are allocated in accordance with the principle of proportional representation. The Senate has the role to look at policy issues before they pass into law and they can advise the Parliament as a kind of monitoring tool. But the Parliament has the autonomy to take the recommendations of the Senate or not. That happened with the reforms, the Senate has the feeling that the Parliament did not adopt much of what was called for in the referendum and did not meet the demands of the Basotho people, so to some extend reforms have not been passed into law.
Decision making is also done by the executive committee and we have youth leagues and women leagues. But the executive committee is not inclusive with them, justified in that they got their space so they work in silence. They are not working hand in hand together, if this is not changing, we are missing social inclusion as a concept.
You mentioned the lack of inclusiveness and accountability, so the delivery of parties is not strong and similar to others. Please present the SAPP&D project.
The Southern African Political Parties and Dialogue Programme (SAPP&D) takes place in 7 countries. Next to Lesotho in Angola, Botswana, Eswathini, Swasiland, Malawi and Sambia. The project aims to work with political parties to build resilient democracies. Also we work with organisations and institutions, but not with society, probably for reasons of sustainability, because if even one person leaves, the memory and skills of an institution remains.
We influence politics on issues like water and energy and have four objectives talking to that issue. The first is internal capacity building like building internal party structures. Second, we are handing them strategic plans helping them to better know how to deal with these issues. Third, we foster social inclusion, as already mentioned, women and youth should be infused within the executive committee. And the fourth objective concerns peer learning, cross-pollination where they share best practices and contextualise.
In Lesotho SAPP&D started operating in 2017 and I would say it was quiet successful. We were building what we call “technical reference groups” about water and energy issues. Our task was to look at what policy is saying and how to ensure that government, civil society and service providers are working together to complement each other’s work. And that was how our technical reference group was constituted, to sit down together, work things out and create a roadmap. So the roles were that service providers came up with beautiful policies that the government would endorse, but for civil society to make sure that policies got implemented, to hold government accountable and to make sure that the service is truly delivered. Now we have a political party, called MIZI, which is specifically a water political party and one of the founder was taking part in the technical reference group.
I would like to know more about you. What is your passion working for DWF?
To answer I have to mention the second project we are working on. There we put women and youth in the center of inclusive economic growth and ensuring that women and youth are included in political decision power, but this time we are implementing it with the local government authorities. Therefore, the community creates an action plan or development plan formed by the youth and women and we ensure that development issues that affects them are truly reflected in this plans. We believe, if the community and district plans are that inclusive, they can be translated in the central government policy and reflects the need of community, creating sustainable and relevant policy.
I am really passionate about youth work and development so working with DWF gives me the platform to influence policies. Young people constitute at least 60 percent of the African population, and if we fail to invest in them now and capacitate them with hard but also soft skills in school, we would miss out certain opportunities, because we won’t have a productive work forth and we would deal with other sociological issues like conflict management. If we do not even address this in the workplace, we are really missing out on preparing our younger generation to also take on leadership roles themselves. That would also perpetuate development problems we have even today because we don’t have anyone with the right skills ready to tackle future problems.
Working with DWF means having access to decision makers and making them aware of certain issues they are not aware of and it gets translated into law, even if it is in five or ten years. DWF is good for me because I get to learn, I get to work with so many ideologies and one other thing is to get mentored. Imagine working with all these parties and twelve or fifteen executive members, that is a whole bunch of knowledge and wisdom and access to plus or minus 150 intelligent minds, and I can interact with them – that is really nice. I love learning self-development so DWF has done that.
Working and accompanying you, I met other CSOs, but how is DWF setting itself apart?
Our approach is very distinctive as we capacitate the custodians. We think if the law makers know better and have a right set of skills they would do the right thing and trickle down into the communities. Moreover, we recognise youth, and social inclusion and we are preaching and practicing this. For example, the DWF team in Lesotho is a four staffed office, we are all under 35 and led by a woman as the country leader. Also, the regional approach sets us apart from others as it is not common in Lesotho and further, we do not approach things in an old fashioned manner, we are not a traditional organisation whose strategies and approaches are carved in stone, rather we bring in new ways of evolution
I met your team and noticed that the working atmosphere is open and consensus orientated. You are the project manager, how do you see your role?
My role is decision making and compliance and I make sure that the team is productive and not inconclusive. It is quite a challenge to balance the participation of team members so that everyone can contribute, even though not everything can be implemented in the end.
I have the personal approach to see and to understand what they mean. For this, it is important to understand people’s personalities and tempers because they are not just workers but individuals. I have to make sure that there is compliance, there is delivery that we adhere to plans, timelines, and policies of the organisations and of donors. So the well-being of the staff is important. If someone is sick, he is not productive, that means we fail in the plans or deadlines. I get into their personal way as I need to know when they are productive, where and in which area.
I see myself in a bigger sister role. Monkey sees, monkey does. In as much I am reaching accountability I have to make sure that they see me accountable. I am growing as a person, but in growing I have to make sure that the others also grow.
If you have one wish concerning DWF, what would it be?
Enlarge the footprint and scope. If possible do the whole of Southern Africa, if possible work with more political parties, if possible work with other democratic institutions, with other IECs, and make sure that civic education is ongoing. To strengthen cross-pollination we need to work in other countries. I want to believe that the work we do would have a greater impact and that the way we work would be more sustainable and create more capacity. If one side is still sick, it affects to a certain extend the other side. I want to believe that if we are moving together towards the same change a lot more can be achieved.
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