I KNOW little of Africa. When it comes to its leaders, among the names that I can easily recall are the revered Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu and the notorious Idi Amin and Robert Mugabe. But have you ever heard of Seretse Khama? I didn’t until I saw the well-crafted film, “A United Kingdom.” Mandela acknowledged him in this manner: “The legacy of Sir Seretse Khama lives on in his country, which continues to be a shining beacon of light and inspiration.”
Starring David Oyelowo (who played the role of Martin Luther King in “Selma”) as Khama and Rosamund Pike as the wife Ruth Williams, the film introduced the English protectorate of Bechuanaland (modern-day Botswana) and the man (Seretse) who sacrificed his kingship to marry a white woman at a time when this was taboo. But beyond the romance angle, the film explores politics, family and nationhood.
While neigboring South Africa was adopting apartheid, Khama, who was educated in England married Williams not only to the objection of the United Kingdom and Tshekedi Khama, Seretse’s uncle and regent of the Bangwatho Kingdom. Politicians, including Winston Churchill, prevented his return when he went to England to legitimize his claim to the throne. How Seretse overcame the powers-that-be in the United Kingdom and convinced his uncle to accept his solution is a study in political ingenuity and statesmanship.
To appease the Churchill government, Khama agreed with his uncle to dismantle the centuries-old kingdom to pave way for a democratic nation. Not only did Botswana obtain independence, it was able to control the diamond mining industry that supported the reforms Khama initiated when he was elected as the country’s first president in 1966 until his death in 1980 at the age of 59.
But why did Mandela describe Khama as “a shining beacon of light and inspiration”? While Mandela was in prison, Khama convinced his countrymen that there was no place for apartheid, having stood by his white wife, Williams, who was accepted as a mother of the nation. He established a stable democratic nation with a multi-party system that has reigned until the present.
Yet one of the measures of a country’s standing in the world is its economy. Botswana, one of the poorest countries in the world, according to Prof. Nake M. Kamrany and Jennifer Gray in the article “Botswana An African Model for Progress and Prosperity” said the country is “leaning towards becoming the Singapore or Hong Kong of southern Africa.”
It is rather unfortunate that most of the news we get from Africa is about HIV, malnutrition, corruption and wars. There is Botswana – the poster nation of the new Africa, the next economic powerhouse of the world. And yes, it all began when Seretse Khama rejected kingship by planting the seeds of democracy that promoted education, rejected corruption and observed freedom.