Botswana, 1969

2. Madam President, it gives me great

pleasure to congratulate you on your election to this

important office. I feel confident that with your long

experience of the work of this Organization, you will steer

this session through to a successful close.

3. I should also like to express my sorrow at the untimely

death of the President of the twenty-third session of this

Assembly, Mr. Emilio Arenales, whose short term of office

will be long remembered for the courage he displayed.

4. I should like, on behalf of my people, to pay tribute to

the Secretary-General’s work for world peace and his

untiring devotion to the service of humanity.

5. Botswana is within 2 week of celebrating the third

anniversary of its independence. My country is thus a

comparative newcomer to the United Nations, and this is

my first opportunity of addressing this General Assembly.

Botswana is a small country in terms of population if not in

area. As a small and poor country, we set a particularly high

value on our membership of the United Nations and those

of its specialized agencies which our budgetary restrictions

have permitted us to join. I should like to emphasize the

particular importance of the United Nations for States like

Botswana which, because of development priorities, are

obliged to restrict their conventional bilateral contacts and

keep their overseas missions to a bare minimum. Here in

New York we can make contacts which would otherwise be

difficult to achieve. The United Nations offers many

advantages to a State like ours. The United Nations enables

us to keep in touch with international opinion and to put

our views before the world.

6. The United Nations is also regarded by small States as

an institution which protects their special interests. Together

with its specialized agencies, it is of course also a

major source of development finance and technical assistance

from which Botswana benefits greatly. I am conscious

of Botswana’s indebtedness to the United Nations, and I am

honoured to have the privilege of putting some of Botswana’s

problems before the world through the Members of

this Assembly.

7. I am aware that there are many international problems

which will come before this Assembly during its twenty-fourth

session, Botswana shares the general alarm at the

prolonged impasse in the Middle East and the dangerous

military escalation that has marked the last months. We are

looking, like most Member States, with anxious eyes

towards Viet-Nam and praying that this tragic and long-drawn-out

conflict will soon be resolved at the conference table.

8. We are watching the civil conflict in Nigeria with even

greater anxiety, since our own continent is directly

affected. Botswana sympathizes fully with those Member

States both inside and outside Africa which want to see the

fighting and the human suffering it involves brought to an

end, and the work of reconstruction and reconciliation

begun. Yet we believe the foundation for the effective

resolution of this dispute in the best interests of all the

peoples of Nigeria remains the work of the Organization of

African Unity. Our efforts earlier this month at Addis

Ababa may not have been crowned with immediate success,

But there is no magic key that will unlock this complex

problem in which so many conflicting interests, including

interests outside Africa, are involved. If the United Nations

has a contribution to make to the resolution of this conflict

it lies in restraining the external Powers involved from

taking actions and adopting policies which could further

delay a negotiated settlement. Botswana favours any

initiative acceptable to both principal parties involved

which will lead to a peaceful and lasting settlement and

which will not threaten the stability and unity of other

African States.

9. Because Botswana is part of a region which faces the

threat of violent conflict, I want on behalf of my people to

lay particular emphasis on the necessity of finding peaceful

solutions to our problems. Southern Africa lives with the

danger of violent racial conflict. I want this afternoon to

discuss the threat of racialism as it affects southern Africa,

and in particular my own country, Botswana; and, within

southern Africa, I should like in particular to draw this

Assembly’s attention to a problem which I fear some

powerful countries would prefer to forget. I refer to the

problem of Rhodesia, which the people of Botswana are in

no position to forget.

10. May I remind you of our geographical position and

our historical circumstances? Botswana is almost entirely

encircled by minority-ruled territories. We have along and

indefensible border with Rhodesia, and a long border with

Namibia and with South Africa itself. The only railway

running between Rhodesia and South Africa passes through

Botswana. Not only is this railway operated by Rhodesia

Railways, but it is vital to both ‘Rhodesian and South

African interests. It is also vital to Botswana because it

provides our only outlet to the sea and to export markets

overseas. Through this route must come the capital goods

necessary for our development. Unlike some other States in

southern and central Africa we have no practical alternative

outlet.

11. We are for historical reasons part of a customs areas

dominated by the industrial might of the Republic of South

Africa. We share the monetary system of the Republic of

South Africa. Our trade and transport systems are inextricably

interlocked with those of South Africa. So meagre are

our own employment prospects that we have for many

years been obliged to permit some of our young men to go

and work in the mines of South Africa. In the immediately

foreseeable future we can find no way of providing

alternative employment for all these men, nor can we

afford to dispense with their earnings.

12. Botswana thus faces unusual and onerous handicaps,

but we also face an unusual and a challenging opportunity.

I should like to describe our position because I believe it

will give Member States a useful insight into the problem

the world faces when considering the question of minority

rule in southern Africa. I should like to explain how

Botswana is responding, not only to the challenge of

under-development, but also to the challenge posed by our

powerful neighbours whose way of life is not our way of

life and whose values in most respects are the reverse of our

own.

13. When my Government took office in 1965 we were

faced with a problem of under-development of classic

proportions. Such development programmes as were

initiated under colonialism no more than scratched the

surface of our problems. Most important of all, in contrast

to other British colonies, there had been practically no

attempt to train Botswanans to run their own country. Not

one single secondary school was completed by the colonial

Government during the whole seventy years of British rule.

There was little provision for vocational training even at the

lowest levels. The roads, water supplies, power supplies on

which industrial development is based were totally inadequate.

We were in the humiliating position of not knowing

many of the basic facts about Botswana on which development

plans could be based. We are still learning about the

resources of our own country.

14. But we are now tackling these problems, and if I

appear to boast of the progress we have made, it is to praise

the efforts of my people rather than to vaunt the

achievements of my colleagues in Government and myself.

We have received generous budgetary assistance and development

aid from the British, who have done much to make

up for their earlier neglect, We have received aid from other

Member States and from the agencies of the United Nations

itself. What is more, all this aid has come without political

strings. There has been no attempt to use aid to change our

domestic or external policies. We will reject all donors who

do not show the same forebearance.

15. Nevertheless, we depend on foreign aid for more than

half our revenue. On what then is based our claim to be an

independent State? Can we aspire to help in developing the

prosperity, unity and freedom of our continent and hence

play a constructive role in world affairs? I believe we can.

Because, although we are for the moment dependent on

foreign aid, we are also self-reliant. Because my people are

mobilizing their own resources, human, physical and

financial, we can accept overseas assistance without loss of

pride. Furthermore, we believe that we have succeeded in

attracting the major part of this aid because we are making

great efforts ourselves, and. because it is recognized that we

have something to offer towards a solution of one of the

world’s most pressing problems, the future of minority-ruled

southern Africa.

16. Botswana is now on the threshold of new and major

development. Since independence it has been discovered

that we are blessed with mineral resources, which, if

exploited, offer us a prospect of financial self-sufficiency

during the 1970s and in the long run the hope of healthy

balanced development in all sectors. My Government is in

the midst of negotiating international loan finance for those

developments. It is a matter of the greatest concern for us

that this money is raised from the right source on the right

terms. For despite all the handicaps of geography, climate

and the legacy of colonial neglect, the people of Botswana

have now embarked on the struggle to reduce our dependence

on neighbouring minority-ruled territories. Only in

this way can the people of Botswana reap in full the

benefits of independence. We feel that only in this way can

the fruits of our labours be fully enjoyed. We did not win

our independence from the British to lose it to a new form

of colonialism from any source whatever.

17. We accept that we are part of southern Africa and that

the harsh facts of history and geography cannot be

obliterated overnight. We recognize that in our present

circumstances we must continue to remain members of the

South African customs union and the South African

monetary area. We have noted South Africa’s assurances of

friendly intentions towards Botswana and other independent

States. We have noted South Africa’s offers to assist

other African States in their development. Botswana

together with Lesotho and Swaziland are in the process of

concluding lengthy negotiations with South Africa on a

new customs agreement. In these negotiations we have not

been seeking aid. Our objective has been to secure an

equitable distribution of the revenues of the customs area,

and the opportunity of protecting our infant industries

while retaining access to the South African market. We

welcome private investment in Botswana from any source

which seeks to build in partnership with our people and not

to drain us of our resources with little or no return to the

country. We are confident that we can coexist with the

Republic of South Africa without sacrificing our national

interest or our fundamental principles.

18. We have made no secret of our detestation of

apartheid, Although for obvious reasons we are obliged to

interpret strictly the principle of non-interference in the

affairs of other States, we have not hidden our views. Our

voice has been heard in this Assembly and in other

international forums in favour of universal self-determination,

in support of peace, solutions of international

conflicts throughout the world, and in please for a realistic

appraisal of what can be achieved by this Organization.

19. Living, as we do, face to face with the realities of

apartheid, we have little sympathy for token demonstrations

and empty gestures. Yet we have unequivocally

condemned the theory and practice of apartheid, and we

deplore its intensification and, particularly, the extension

of the full apparatus of apartheid to the international trust

territory of Namibia. Nevertheless, for obvious reasons,

Botswana must maintain diplomatic contacts with South

Africa. For equally obvious reasons, we decline to consider

an exchange of diplomatic representatives until South

Africa can fully guarantee that Botswana’s representatives

will, in all respects, at all times and in all places, be treated

in the same way as diplomats from other countries.

20. We have expressed our opposition to Portugal’s

unyielding refusal to permit any progress towards

self-determination in Angola, Mozambique and Guinea (Bissau).

We have declined to entertain diplomatic relations with the

Portuguese in the absence of any commitment on the part

of Portugal to allow the indigenous people of their so-called

overseas provinces to proceed to independence. Our criticism

of Portugal’s policies is not based on an argument

about the timing of a programme for progress towards

self-determination but on the point-blank refusal of the

Portuguese Government to concede that those Territories

can ever choose to move towards independence.

21. I should like to draw attention at this point to the

firmly-stated preference, endorsed by all independent

African States in the Lusaka Manifesto on Southern Africa

for the achievement of self-determination through negotiation.

It was thus that Botswana achieved majority rule, and

eventually independence; and that has been the path which

most African States have been fortunate enough to tread. It

is the wish of the Government and people of Botswana that

the indigenous populations of the neighbouring Territories

should eventually share this experience.

22. One consequence of our geographical position is that

Botswana has provided a refuge for many who, for one

reason or another, have found themselves unable to

continue to live in neighbouring minority-ruled Territories.

Botswana recognizes a responsibility to those victims of

political circumstance and we are trying to discharge that

responsibility as well as our resources permit. Refugees

come to Botswana from Angola, Mozambique, Rhodesia,

South West Africa and South Africa. At present there are

more than 4,000 recognized refugees in Botswana. In

January 1969 my Government acceded to the 1951

Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and also to

the 1967 Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees.

23. Botswana grants asylum and assistance to genuine

political refugees who seek our aid. The financial burden of

doing so would have been heavy were it not for the

generous assistance we have received from the United

Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the World Food

Programme, the World Council of Churches, and other

international bodies. On our part, we have granted refugees

recognition of their status; we have allowed them to settle

in various parts of our country and find jobs or open their

own businesses; and, where possible, we educate them as

well as our limited educational and training facilities

permit. Equally important, we issue United Nations travel

documents with a return clause to those refugees who wish

to travel to other countries where suitable training

establishments are able to accept them.

24. The majority of refugees in Botswana have come from

Angola. Those people have been settled on a

hundred-square-mile farming scheme. Through training in agriculture

and fishing they will, we hope, like many other refugees,

become integrated with the citizens of Botswana. We have

welcomed them to our country; they can make their home

with us until their own countries achieve Governments

acceptable to them.

25. I have already referred to certain constraints which

Botswana faces when considering its position on southern

African issues. I have also mentioned certain principles

which guide us. Our constant concern is to respect those

constraints while not violating the principles.

26. The future of Rhodesia is of the utmost possible

concern to Botswana. I have referred to our long and

indefensible common frontier. My Government, from the

outset, has condemned the unilateral declaration of

independence. We are committed to support the principle of no

independence before majority rule. For that reason we

joined the majority of Commonwealth countries in rejecting

the Fearless proposals. We condemned, in no uncertain

terms, the illegal régime’s constitutional proposals which

entrench discrimination and separate development and

which definitively block the possibility of a peaceful

transition to majority rule, for which the 1961 Constitution,

at least in theory, provided. We recognize that these

proposals, endorsed by an unrepresentative electorate, end

the prospect of a peaceful transition to majority rule

without some form of external intervention to secure it.

These proposals are now being implemented by the Smith

régime.

27. I warned the white minority in Rhodesia that by

taking this course they were increasing the risk of violent

conflict and endangering the stability of the region.

Botswana is on record as favouring the reassertion of British

rule in Rhodesia. That course is the only one which offers a

hope, however faint, of a peaceful transition to majority

rule. I recognize that the white minority in Rhodesia,

conscious of the injustice it has inflicted, and fearing the

justifiable bitterness of the oppressed African population,

will feel the need for some guarantee that the transition to

democratic non-racial government should be gradual and

peaceful.

28. One way in which Britain could restore its authority is

by the use of force. But I think that we must now accept,

whether we approve of that decision or not, that Britain is

not, under present circumstances, prepared to resort to

force. Botswana feels that it follows that alternatives to

force must be considered. There comes a point when one

policy, having been pushed to its limits, must be accepted

as having failed, and must give way to another. It is

essential that Britain be held to its legal and moral

responsibility to the African majority in Rhodesia. There

must be no absolution.

29. This, I have to admit, leaves us with a policy which, as

many Member States have argued in past debates, has been

far from successful. I refer to mandatory sanctions. Yet for

all the frustrations and disappointments to which the tardy

application of sanctions has given rise, it remains essential

that they be in fact maintained and intensified. We feel that

those sanctions serve an important purpose, even if they are

not extended to include South Africa. Just as it is clear that

neither Britain nor any other country will use military force

against the Smith régime, it is clear that an effective

boycott of South Africa, on this or any other issue, cannot

be achieved. The existing sanctions are thus at the present

time all that stand between the rebel régime’s success and

failure. That being the case, rather than dismissing the

sanctions weapon as totally ineffective, it is surely wiser to

try and make them as effective as possible.

30. While it is important not to over-estimate the impact of

sanctions, it should not be too readily accepted that

sanctions have had no effect at all on Rhodesia. From our

position we can see some of the effects of sanctions and I

can assure this Assembly that they are not negligible.

31. To permit them to be eroded at this point would be

unnecessarily to concede defeat. Certain consequences

would follow. The way would be opened to diplomatic

recognition by Powers which are at the moment hanging

back from this step. Rhodesia’s links with Portugal and

South Africa would be enormously strengthened and the

whole minority position in southern Africa would be

consolidated. There are, I am convinced, elements both in

South Africa and Portugal, and in the world at large, which

have serious doubts about the viability of Rhodesia as a

white-ruled State, given its rapidly expanding African

population and its handicapped economy. Lifting sanctions

would liberate the fettered Rhodesia economy and serve to

restore the confidence of such observers in the viability of

continued white supremacy.

32. For this reason Botswana appeals to all Member States

to make what contribution they can to rendering sanctions

more effective; and here I should like to pay tribute to the

work of the United Nations supervisory committee and of

the Sanctions Committee. On their efforts and those of the

Member States of this Organization are pinned the last

hopes of preventing the illegal régime from imposing

permanently its own version of apartheid on the people of

Rhodesia, for whose welfare this Organization has assumed

a certain degree of responsibility. The present international

isolation of the illegal régime and those who support it

must be maintained. Our own difficulties in the matter of

sanctions are obvious but we are attempting to play our

part within the limitations imposed by our frail economy

and our landlocked position. We have prevented Rhodesia

from using its railway to import arms and military supplies.

Botswana's airline has ceased to fly into Rhodesia. We are

preparing to do more. Botswana has committed itself to

diverting long-standing trade with Rhodesia, despite the

very considerable economic and administrative problems

which such a course presents. Contingency planning is well

advanced.

33. Our contribution to this struggle can only be a small

one for we are not a rich and powerful country. But we are

hopeful that it will help to check the erosion of sanctions.

There are other Powers which live less closely with this

problem than ourselves but which can make a greater

contribution towards solving it.

34. May I conclude on a more general point, but one

which also relates to southern Africa? I have referred to

Botswana’s prospects of mineral development and to our

hopes that this will permit us to dispense with budgetary

aid and to develop a balanced and prosperous economy and

a healthy non-racial democracy. We hope this for the sake

of our people, but we also look forward to it with all the

more eager anticipation because we recognize that it will

permit us to make a greater contribution to solving the

problems of our region. By this I do not mean that we will

depart from our principle of non-interference in the affairs

of neighbouring sovereign States. But Botswana as a

thriving majority-ruled State on the borders of South Africa

and Namibia will present an effective and serious challenge

to the credibility of South Africa’s racial policies and in

particular its policy of developing so-called Bantu home-

lands and its stated goal of eventual independence for these

Bantustans. It could force them to abandon the policy or

attempt to make it a more immediate reality and even face

the prospect of surrendering sovereignty to genuinely

independent States. Either reaction would have important

political consequences. A prosperous non-racial democracy

in Botswana immediately adjacent to South Africa and.

Namibia will add to the problems which South Africa is

already facing in reconciling its irrational racial policies

with its desire for economic growth.

35. If Botswana is to sustain this role, which you will

recognize is not an easy one, its independence must be

preserved. This means that we must ensure that we are

insulated from any instability which the policies of neighbouring

white-ruled countries may provoke. It also means

that Botswana needs the support and sympathy of friendly

nations. We recognize that our independence ultimately

depends on the durability of our political institutions and

on our success in achieving economic development. But our

independence is also buttressed by our external relations.

We have friends in all continents. Our membership of the

United Nations is in itself a source of strength. I should like

to appeal to all Member States in their deliberations on the

question of southern Africa to recall not only Botswana’s

particular problems but also our potential contribution to

achieving change by peaceful means.