The issue of national security gives every country sleepless nights. Wondering about the cracks and crevices that could potentially become their undoing. What exactly is national security? National security is the security and defence of an independent state. This is inclusive of its citizens, institutions, and economy. Threats to national security may range from external threats, such as external terrorist attacks, to internal factors such as economic instability and cyberattacks. It is of utmost pertinence that countries constantly rebuild and strengthen their national security strategies, as national security maintains peace and stability within a country. The areas of national security that ought to be protected against are military attacks, threats to public health and the environment, economic instability, terrorism, and cyberattacks.
When the average layman thinks of a threat to national security, they tend to focus only on external factors: most commonly terrorist attacks or public health crises stemming from foreign transmission. What is often overlooked, however, is that a nation can itself be a threat, even the cause of its own decline in national security. These are the internal threats. the ones that are frequently ignored, yet can significantly impact a nation’s stability.
What about Botswana? Long regarded as a peaceful state, it has had little to worry about in terms of national security: a country seen as having an almost impenetrable shield. But what happens when cracks begin to show? At what point do people begin to notice the hairline fractures in that shield?
The First Crack
Since Botswana’s independence in the mid-1900s, the country has enjoyed relative peace and a lack of disturbance in respect to its national security. With little to nothing to worry about for decades. The first crack presented itself to the country as a public health crisis. The spread of HIV and Aids in the late 90s and early 2000s ravaged the southernmost part of the African continent. With alarming numbers, the death and infection rates spiked, and the nation stood still at the mercy of the silent killer. The first hairline fracture in the picturesque landscape that was Botswana’s National Security.
In this time of peril, Botswana’s life expectancy plummeted from 67 years to 47 years. Many productive adults succumbed to this virus, inadvertently leading to a shortage of skilled workforce, leaving behind job insecurity in its wake. This unexpected pandemic rocked Botswana at its core, leaving its citizens and government to pick up the pieces and move on. Provision of ARVs and implementation of programs that stopped mother-to-child transmission championed the end of this era.
The Second Crack
There has always been global dissent when it came to how much power the Constitution conferred onto the president. Global criticisms outlined the possible problems that may stem from this centralization of power. Botswana caught its first whiff of this problematic centralization of power in 2008.
In 2008, President Ian Khama took his place in the executive, coinciding with the formal establishment of the DIS, the Directorate of Intelligence and Security. The DIS essentially operated entirely under the president and only answered to him. Talk of this special branch being used as a coercive tool by the president became widespread, and worries about this special branch’s independence started to deepen. Towards the end of Khama’s 10-year reign, the nation grappled with rumors of extrajudicial killings of political opponents at the hands of Ian Khama. The second crack in the shield of national security: Khama’s control over the DIS, the fear of military coercion, and the authoritarian nature of its control.
The Third Crack
With President Masisi taking the presidential seat in 2018, no one could have ever predicted the second public crisis that cast a dark cloud not only on Botswana but also upon the entire global community a year after his inauguration. COVID-19: a virus that wiped out millions and depleted governments of their resources in a scramble to reduce its devastating effect. The third rift in the weakening shield that is Botswana’s national security: COVID-19 and how it thrust countries, including Botswana, into economic instability.
There was a loss of jobs, and supply-and-demand businesses suffered massive losses on a global scale, and Botswana was not exempt. The pandemic hit the world unexpectedly and with force, forcing governments to cover gaps that were never planned for with resources and money. With the disruption in supply and demand caused by COVID, tenders for supplying the public would open up. These tenders would be procured by blackened hearts that would pocket these funds under the guise of returning aid to the masses: the height of procurement fraud, white-collar crime.
Not only was Masisi faced with COVID and the increased procurement fraud, but the fourth crack was looming over his head. The fourth crack worked hand in hand with COVID to exert even more damage to national security.
The Fourth Crack
The slump in diamond sales: the same diamonds that uphold Botswana’s economy as its number one export. As many benefits as technology has brought humanity, along with it comes a drop in sales of natural resources that may now be outsourced from labs. Lab-grown diamonds: inexpensive to procure and even less to maintain. This evolution in technology threw a wrench in Botswana’s primary source of sustainability: its diamonds. The fourth breach in Botswana’s national security: economic instability.
Botswana’s diamond sales started to plummet towards the second half of 2023, and the drop has only steepened as the years have gone by. With the introduction of lab-grown diamonds, there has been less global reliance on Botswana as one of the world’s diamond powerhouses. The very mineral that thrust Botswana into its modern position and sustained its economy has taken a dip, bringing disastrous consequences. This decline has inadvertently caused job losses, reduced fiscal revenue, and a widened budget deficit. In response, the country has attempted to devalue its currency to make diamonds more competitive, while also seeking alternative avenues to increase revenue.
What’s The Next Step?
Ignorance of public security and defence aids the government in avoiding addressing these issues head-on as threats to national security. The continued neglect of the importance of internal national security threats dampens the potential for reforms and systems that could curb further cracks in the country’s national security. Civil education on internal threats is the first step toward addressing these problems: alongside a clearer acknowledgement of these risks and a more defined concept of national security. Although Botswana has legislation that addresses national security, it falls short in adequately confronting internal threats in a coordinated and coherent manner. Further discourse is necessary to bridge these gaps before the country inevitably faces another crack in its national security shield.
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