“A righteous man can fall seven times but will rise”, says the recently reinstated Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF) president Biggie Butale.

After a challenging year of scandals and suspensions, Butale believes that he comes back as a strong and unshakeable man in politics. To him, his temporary down fall was part of being refined by God and also being renewed.

In an interview with Mmegi this week, Butale admits that 2021 was a bad year for him as he had challenges in his private life, spiritually and politically. Butale said if it was not of the spiritual faith he has in God, he could have given up on politics. However, Butale said he knew that he would come back stronger than before. The BPF leader indicated that he has remerged as a peace maker and now preaches unity amongst party members and opposition politics.

Butale was suspended from the BPF last year after he was accused of sexual misconduct which led him to be suspended from the party and being dropped from the presidency.

“There is no power on earth that can derail God’s destiny for me. Many people expected me to collapse but never got to understand where I got strength. It was my faith and prayer. My ups and downs did not make me lose focus on things that I want and the truth I believe in. My focus is in building the party and ensuring that opposition parties cooperate in the coming general election, 2024,”he highlighted.

Butale admitted that the BPF leadership was divided especially the National Executive Committee (NEC) but its division was not that deep at lower structures. “Our members were not impressed with the misunderstandings that were happening but they kept on asking the leadership to reconcile. Pressure from the membership as well as Members of Parliament (MPs) helped us to engage independent people for us to negotiate. Our party is now at peace and we are hopeful that we will hold a progressive congress next year,” Butale revealed.

He said he was aware that their divisions were fuelled by some people from the ruling party, the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP).

Butale, however, said he has no illusion that his enemies in government will not rest until they had destroyed him.

In addition, he said the BPF is destroyed by some moles who keep on leaking party confidential information and ensuring division. He said his party will emerge stronger even after going through such difficult times.

Still on the matter, the leader of BPF said he is happy that Batswana are now realising that the ruling party no longer cares about their welfare but rather its self enrichment.

Recently before reconciliation and Butale’s reinstatement as president, Lobatse High Court’s Justice Matlhogonolo Phuthego had ruled in favour of the party’s acting president, Caroline Lesang in a case in which she was challenging Butale’s claim to the presidency after the party’s Disciplinary Committee (DC) pardoned him.

Lesang had asked the court to make an order forbidding Butale from convening, arranging, staging, chairing, or presiding over any meeting of the NEC of the BPF and/or any affiliates, organs, or structures of the BPF.

In his ruling, Justice Phuthego said there is no ambiguity that Butale continues to be barred from discharging the duties of a president as he failed to appeal the DC’s decision to pardon him as just an ordinary member.