Botswana, officially the Republic of Botswana, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory part of the Kalahari Desert. It is bordered by South Africa to the south and southeast, Namibia to the west and north, Zambia to the north and Zimbabwe to the northeast. With a population of slightly over 2.4 million people and a comparable land area to France, Botswana is one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world. It is essentially the nation-state of the Tswana people, who constitute nearly 80 percent of the population.
The Presidential Commission of Inquiry into Land Problems in Mogoditshane and Other Peri-Urban Villages, also known as the Kgabo Commission, was a 1991 commission of inquiry established by the government of Botswana. It was created to investigate allegations that land was being sold and purchased illegally in peri-urban villages such as Mogoditshane without the authorisation of land boards. Englishman Kgabo was appointed as its chairman. It published its findings and recommendations in the Kgabo Report, which found that due to housing shortages and a failure of the land board system, most land sales in Mogoditshane were unauthorised.
The commission caused a major political scandal when it implicated Vice-President Peter Mmusi and Minister of Agriculture Daniel Kwelagobe, both of whom held leadership positions in the dominant Botswana Democratic Party (BDP). They resigned from their positions, but the party reelected them as party leaders in the subsequent congress. The accusations against Mmusi and Kwelagobe were declared void by the High Court of Botswana because they were not granted a hearing to defend themselves. The scandal prompted two factions to form within the party, those who supported Mmusi and Kwelagobe and those who opposed them, and these factions dominated politics in Botswana for the next two decades. (Full article...)
... that during his stay at the Kolobeng Mission, David Livingstone wrote in his memoir that the soil temperature in the sun at noon reached 134 °F (57 °C)?
Botswana sent a delegation to compete at the 2016 Summer Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from 7 to 18 September 2016. This was the country's second time competing at a Summer Paralympic Games after making its debut at the 2004 Summer Paralympics. Botswana was represented by one athlete, Keatlaretese Mabote, a short-distance sprinter. He competed in one event, the men's 400 metres T12 competition, where he was eliminated in the heat stages because he was third in his heat and only the top two participants in a heat progressed to the semi-finals. (Full article...)
Image 30Mokgweetsi Masisi speaking at a conference on the illegal wildlife trade in London in 2018 (from History of Botswana)
Image 31A 1960 stamp of the Bechuanaland Protectorate featuring images of Queen Victoria and Elizabeth II, the first and last British monarchs of the protectorate (from History of Botswana)
