The Ministry of Defence, Justice and Security (MDJS) wishes to respond to an article titled ‘BDF COMMANDER ASSAULTS JUNIOR’, published in the Midweek Sun dated Wednesday, May 22 2013. The allegations raised in the article are not only false and unfounded, but also malicious in intent.
For... the record this Ministry denies the allegation that the Commander of the Botswana Defence Force and his subordinate, the Deputy Chief of Staff Personnel ever engaged in a fist fight. We also reject as false and malicious the further allegation that the Commander was at any time Absent Without Leave (AWOL), or communicated intent to quit. On the 13th May 2013 the Commander in fact attended a Pre-Public Accounts Committee (PAC) workshop with other accounting officers held at Maharaja Restaurant organised by the Clerk of the National Assembly
We are all the more disappointed with the article given that on the 20th May 2013 a meeting was arranged with reporters from the Midweek Sun to address the allegations, which we believed had been effectively laid to rest.
We further note that the Deputy Chief of Staff Personnel, Brigadier Gaborone, has himself unequivocally refuted the allegation that any assault took place, much less that he had been engaged in any “humiliating fist fight” as claimed.
This article exhibits a reckless indifference to negative reporting on the part of the reporter and the newspaper. It is written with a deliberate intent to misinform the public and put the image of the BDF and the Commander in disrepute.
Finally the Ministry wishes to confirm that the relationship between the Commander and his subordinates has always been professional.
We therefore, demand an unconditional retraction of the article by the newspaper and that it is given the same prominence as that of the article in question.
S.G.Tabudi
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For/PERMANENT SECRETARY