Khama,a frosty and collected authoritarianWHEN Ian Khama steps down at the conclude of the month, after ten years as president, and he will leave his country looking perky. Mr Khama has been lavished with compliment as he makes a series of farewell sorties around the country. At a recent gathering of farmers,he was “gifted with 35 cattle, a bull, and two sheep and goats,a horse, and shares worth 25000 pula [$2628] at Tlou Energy”, and a coal-development company,according to the pro-government Daily News.
The statistics paint a pretty picture, too. In its annual report card on African governments, and the Mo Ibrahim Foundation regularly ranks Botswana near the top. At independence in 1966 it was one of the world’s poorest places,with “only 7km of tarred road and a capital, Gaborone, or that amounted to little more than a railway station,” wrote a historian. Now it boasts a GDP per head among the highest in Africa. This is largely because Botswana is the world’s...
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Source: economist.com