Sir Seretse Khama, first president of Botswana

0:00This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK.

0:07Every day, millions of customers engage with AI agents like me. We work round the clock and have the facts at our fingertips. We're fast and effective, but incredibly patient. And we're built on Sierra, the leading AI-powered customer experience platform. No hold music, just answers and action. Visit sierra.ai to learn more. That's sierra.ai.

0:39BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Today's guest is a distinguished professor of astrophysics. And his choice? The first president of Botswana. What an interesting and unexpected mix. Professor Mike Bode, give us the name of your great life and tell us why. The great life I've chosen is Sir Saretsi Karma. That's a name that was sort of in the back of my mind from when I was a child, but I really couldn't say why. I couldn't say who he was. It was just after I retired that a former research student of mine became one of the first astronomers in Botswana. He got in touch with me to say, Mike, would you be interested in helping us to develop astronomy and space science in Botswana for six months, three years or five years?

1:29And I said, oh, hang on, maybe six months. So anyway, I went there for six months. But as preparation for that, I talked to a couple of friends of mine who had lived in South Africa and knew Botswana pretty well. And they recommended one or two things to have a look at. One of which was the film A United Kingdom about the life of Sussretzi Karmann. And it was at that point I realised why I'd remembered this name. And in a word, in a sentence, what recommended him to your admiring attention? He is truly an inspirational person. He struggled against exile and prejudice. Both he and his wife, Ruth, worked together.

2:12He was exiled in the United Kingdom for several years. Ruth was a white woman, it's worth mentioning. Yes, that's right. She was a white woman. That marriage was not accepted by her father, for example, so there were family difficulties there. it was not accepted by the British government it was not accepted by part of the nation back in Betuanaland particularly the regent, his uncle he forgave those people and he forgot about it and he got along with his life Is that what you admire about him? It is that forgiveness his positive attitude to things the fact he wanted to share the wealth that eventually came mainly from diamonds among the people of the country and not keep it among a certain clique of people of which he could have been part and the fact that he leaves such a positive legacy behind him.

2:58Mike, I should add, is Emeritus Professor of Astrophysics at Liverpool John Moores University. What have you been doing in Botswana? Well, I was very pleased and surprised to be offered a visiting professorship at the relatively newly formed Botswana International University of Science and Technology in Palapi, near to Soroe, which is the heartland of Sreksyakama's nation. And what I've been doing there is to help them to develop astronomy and space science. I was involved in writing their first national strategy for space science and technology. I've been the founding chair of the Botswana Astronomical Society.

3:40And this actually links to the number one ladies detective agency books, because it was at a talk at the president's hotel near to Christmas in 2017. and I said I was astounded. There are no astronomical societies in Botswana and yet you have some of the clearest skies in the world. And we formed the society and it's actually going strong. Monthly meetings, sky viewings, schools are involved. It's fantastic. No one can say that great lives doesn't take us in all directions. Astrophysics, clear skies and sorexic karma. He was born in 1921. He was, within his own tribal society, an aristocrat at a time when Botswana was the British protectorate of Betuanaland.

4:27And he became president of the newly independent nation in 1966, which barely scratches the detail of his life. How much more do you know about him? I know a lot more than I did before. I've read Susan Williams' book, Colobar, on which that film was based. It's a life that parallels Mandela's. his legacy is actually more positive than Mandela's. It has been more enduring in many ways. Absolutely, absolutely right. Is he still remembered there? Yes, he is, very much so. I was just talking to some colleagues there a couple of days ago and asking that very same question, and they said, oh, yes, of course, the father of the nation.

5:04Let's have a listen, then, to the father of the nation, the great man. Here he is in 1966, talking at the opening of a conference on the future of Betuanaland, or Botswana, as it became. It has always been my belief that Bechuanaland, small country though it may be, has a role to play in Southern Africa. And in the unnecessary conflict between black and white, the proposals I have put forward aim at establishing a non-racial society in which each individual will have an equal right of expression and of opportunity, no matter what his race or colour. As you mentioned, there was a film based on the book by my guest here in the studio, and you've mentioned her already, Dr Susan Williams.

5:53That book was called Colour Bar, the triumph of Saretsi Karma and his nation. Any thoughts on that film, Susan? David Oyelowo, who plays the role of Saretsi Karma, is utterly convincing and very powerful and manages to exemplify so much of the virtues we've just been discussing. Because I think one thing to remember is that when Botswana was a protectorate, which effectively is a British colony, it suffered greatly from neglect. Even its capital city was not in the protectorate. It was over the border in South Africa. Mafeking. Yes, exactly. And public services were almost non-existent. Child mortality rate was extremely high.

6:37An impoverished country and very much a neglected country. Your book, Susan, begins with a young 24-year-old, Soretzi, coming to Britain to study law. Who was this young man and what was his background in then Betuanaland? Well, he came from a royal family. He was the heir to the kingship of the Banguato, destined to take on the role of cosy, of king. But his father died when he was very young and so the role was handed to his uncle, Shikadi Karma, who was known as the regent. acting on behalf of Soretzi. Shikady was a bit concerned that Soretzi karma had become very distrustful of white people.

7:19And one of the reasons for that is that the white settler community in the Betuanaland protectorate were, many of them were racist and unjust, but also Soretzi had been to school in South Africa, to missionary schools, and then he'd been to the Fort Hare Native University, And then he went to Witwatersrand University in Johannesburg, where he saw South African racism and segregation. Yes, you mentioned his hatred of racism and also his personal sense of affront. And let me quote him here. I disliked them intensely because I thought they disliked me. I suppose some of them did. That's Soretzi himself.

8:00Mike, what do you make of that? He's talking about white people when he's still quite young. Yeah, it's interesting, isn't it? I mean, to be in Botswana now, you see the legacy in terms of it being such a mixed society. And I never felt any antagonism or racism. I remember one day after being there a couple of weeks, I was staying in a hotel where they filmed some of the film, A United Kingdom. And I looked up for my breakfast and I thought, I'm the only white person in this room. It didn't matter. And I didn't see the colour of people at all. That was fantastic. That was fantastic. You mentioned the Palapi Hotel.

8:40Yes. I was just remembering the fact that under British rule, black people were not allowed to enter. Unless they were servants, they had to go round the back. So things have changed a lot. Yes. So this is the background to the attitudes which surrounded Soretzi when he was young. He came to Britain and no doubt met a certain amount of racism too. But then he met Ruth Williams. Tell me a little bit about her, Susan. Siretzi, of course, arrived just after the end of the war and he had a couple of years that were rather difficult. He first went to Oxford when he felt very unwelcome. Then he moved to London and he felt so much happier in London because there were other African students there at his student hostel.

9:25And someone came to Nutford House, which was the name, as I say, of his student hostel called Ruth Williams, brought by her sister Muriel, who very much had missionary zeal and she was involved with the London Missionary Society and they were putting on a dinner dance for the African students. Muriel thought that Soretzi and Ruth would get along extremely well. They both shared a lively sense of humour and they also both loved jazz. And the following morning, Soretzi said to his friend Charles Njonjo from Kenya, I've met the woman I want to marry. Three months later, Soretzi plucked up the courage to invite her on a date to go to a concert of the Ink Spots, which was...

10:10Oh, I remember the Ink Spots. You remember the Ink Spots? That's wonderful. Well, they love the Ink Spots, and from the moment of that first date, spent all the time together that they possibly could. We have an interview here with Ruth Williams, or Lady Karma, as she became, recorded in 1984. He was very keen that I should know about Botswana before I went out. He was a person who couldn't stand divorce, and he said he didn't want me to go out, and finally I wasn't able to stand the country because the difference was so great. When I arrived, it was exactly as he had described it. Key question for all of you.

10:47How was news of the marriage to Ruth greeted at the time, Susan? This has background, of course, because when Soretzi and Ruth decided to get married, there was a lot of opposition. Yes. There was opposition in Betuan land by Zaretsi's uncle Shikady. Also a great deal of opposition in the UK because the British government was under pressure from the South African government not to allow the marriage to take place. And the idea of a mixed marriage on the border was absolutely appalling for them. And so a great deal of pressure was put on the British government at the very highest levels. There was also pressure from the London Missionary Society and also Ruth had been told by her parents that they were disgusted by the idea of a mixed marriage.

11:37So they went forward and got married in a civil ceremony. So opposition politically by the British government spurred on by the South African government, opposition within Britain, including by the church and opposition by his uncle in Betuaneland itself. Absolutely, and he sent for his lawyer in Cape Town to come immediately so that they could make plans to stop the wedding. I'm just thinking, Mike, what a brave couple they were when everybody on all sides, for every kind of reason, opposed them. I mean, A, they must have been very much in love, but B, they were also just very brave and independent-minded people.

12:19Ruth is a hero of this story as well, and there were some surprising people who were the villains in this, Clem Attlee of the Labour Party wasn't... Absolutely, yeah. But there were some heroes on our side that I would never have imagined, such as Lord Hume, who eventually became Prime Minister. Really? I like Douglas Hume? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Quentin Hogg. Yes, and that doesn't surprise me. Here from two decades ago is Professor Willie Henderson, who's written about Soretzi Karma and knew him quite well. The church authorities in Britain actually didn't wish to marry them, and they married in a registry office.

12:59Siretzi then returned to Betuanaland to be with his uncle. His uncle was a very powerful regent and was very much in charge of the political scene in Surui, and his uncle made public knowledge at the Khotla meeting that he was against the marriage. What ensued were a series of fairly dramatic Khotla meetings, and the outcome of this was a government report into Saretsi's suitability to be chief. The report said that he was unsuitable but not in terms of his personal characteristics or indeed in his choice of wife but in relation to the political events in southern Africa where a government dedicated to bringing in apartheid recently come to power and the position of chiefs had a particular significance in that kind of structure.

13:47From the archive, it seems Ruth thought everything was going to be fine. Yes, that is what we both thought, because there had been these three quarterly meetings beforehand and it had been decided there that they were prepared to accept our marriage. And so we really were surprised when the British government set up the Commission of Inquiry into something silly like whether or not my husband was a fit and proper person to be chief of the tribe. and they decided that he was not a fit person to be chief of the tribe so therefore he should live in exile. I think it's worth noting that at the final cutler where the decision was reached that Siretzi would indeed be installed as Kosi, as the chief of the Banguato Reserve there was a development that was very new and you have to remember that about 9 ,000 people went to this cutler they went on foot, ox cart, donkey and they cared enormously about what was going to happen.

14:48And at the Kotler, which lasted 10 days, Soretzi set out his view. Shikadi, his uncle, set out his view and some other people spoke as well. And just towards the end, Soretzi stood up and said, I would like all the people who support me to stand up. And almost everybody of these 9 ,000 people stood up and appalled Shikadi. But it was a very exciting moment for the people at the Kotler, and they all stood up and said, Pula, Pula, Pula, and it was very, very moving. You're listening to The Great Life of Sir Saretsi Karma, first president of Botswana, nominated by Mike Bode, Emeritus Professor of Astrophysics.

15:32Earlier, the producer spoke to someone who knew Ruth Williams, his wife, or Lady Ruth Karma, as she became. Play the tape. She was a very strong woman coming all the way from England, going to Cerroi in the middle of nowhere, all because of love. I mean, yeah, it takes a lot of guts, a lot of strength for someone to do that. But she did it. So there was strength to her. My name is Trevamwanda, Bishop Trevamwanda. I was an Anglican bishop and now Ruth was a parishioner of the cathedral in Habarone. And we got on extremely well and discovered that she also loved jazz. I love jazz. And that's our first matter.

16:19In one of your sermons, Trevor, you talk about the love between Soretzi and Ruth. And you also refer to the colonial government's frankly hostile attitude to their marriage. Can you tell us about that? Well, yes, a grave matter. Well, it's politics. This is 1948. And there you have the British Empire. Things are changing. It's after the war. But in the context of Ruth and Sereze, he is a heir to the kingship of the Banguato, and they fall in love. He's black, African. She is white, English. and Bechuanaland, as it was called then, the neighbor was South Africa. And in 1948, the Nationalist Party also came into power with their apartheid policy of racial segregation and separation.

17:15And it was like, what an insult to have an African, a black man across the border, getting married to a white woman. It cut straight to the whole question of white supremacy. because South Africa with its gold and uranium, and this was essential to the British government that this relationship should not be sacrificed by recognizing and allowing this African to marry this white English lady. And so they didn't care about love. They just cared about interest, about material interest, political interest, a dominance. So it's unfortunate, but that's what happened. That was Bishop Mwamba talking to my producer.

18:02In your book, Susan, you say Saretsi sent Ruth a telegram which reads, tribe and myself tricked by British government and banned from the whole protectorate, love Saretsi. It's shocking stuff, isn't it? It is shocking and it's also against the background of what they were already putting up with in London. They experienced the colour bar almost every day and in fact Ruth at one point very bitterly said no colour bar in London might as well say no sand in the Sahara. And initially the Labour government exiled Soretzi from his nation for five years. And it was hoped that when the Conservative government came in under Churchill in 1951, this would end the exile because Winston Churchill had described the treatment of the commerce as a very disreputable transaction.

18:57But this is not what happened. Yeah, I bet the Foreign Office got it, the Prime Minister. I bet that's what happened. Why isn't it better known? Yeah, that's a very good question. I mean, I was only vaguely aware of Soretzi Karma. I remember having a telephone call with the then head of physics at Oxford and he was saying, oh, you're going to Botswana. And I could hear him scrabbling around at the other end of the phone. And then he said, it's big, isn't it? He was obviously looking at a map and I said, yes, it's bigger than France, but with the population of Greater Manchester. so I think it's partly because it is so stable tends to make the news in this country if it makes the news at all because of elephants but generally things go smoothly it works very well it's a peaceful country I can testify to that yeah it's outstanding rather unusual but you had something more to say go on yes I just wanted to just to say about Zaretsi and also Shikadi They put aside their political differences for the benefit of their people.

20:05Despite the difficulties they'd had over Ruth joining the family, they came to an agreement that Soretzi would renounce his right to be Kosi, to be chief, and that Shikadi would not fight with him. And they wished to make a demand to be allowed back home. And they presented this wish to the government. At that time, the Banguato people had been waging a campaign of passive resistance, which was being met in a very punitive way with public floggings of women by the British officials in the Kotla, and men being tethered to lion traps, and all sorts of terrible things were happening. And Siretsi and Shikady knew this must not continue anymore, so they put aside all their differences.

20:51Their compromise was accepted by the British government. Here's the Bulawayo Chronicle, Bulawayo being the city quite close to the border with Botswana in Rhodesia, on his return. They say, men threw their hats in the air and while some women flung themselves to the ground, others kissed the car's bonnet. It's a lovely, lovely picture. People were celebrating, very often using the word pula, which is a Setswana word for rain, which of course is so important in Botswana, which is largely semi-desert. It must have been an extraordinary moment at midnight of independence in October 1966. There had been drought for several years.

21:33And so coming up to midnight, the Union Jack is brought down. The new Botswana flag is raised up and gets tugged a little bit. and then suddenly it's unfurled and at that moment it started to rain. It's just extraordinary. Yes, and there was such a rainstorm for several days. Botswana achieved independence in September 1966, now led by Soretzi, who'd formed a political party and won elections the previous year. He was also made a knight commander of the British Empire by the Queen, so quite a turnaround in just over a decade. There's a nice quote here about how the stone that was rejected has now become the head cornerstone and that Sir Saretsi and Lady Karma had overcome the follies and prejudices of little men parading as gods.

22:23I think we're going to hear from Bishop Mwamba again. When he took over, he did not do that on his own. He was a consensus man. He just provided the leadership. He provided the confidence. He provided the hope. because he had endured all these things, but he was able to tell people, do not despair, don't give up, all shall be well. And so Botswana would have developed, but they discovered, of course, the diamonds. And by his leadership, the economy was prudently managed, prudently managed, no corruption. His people, his team around him, such as Quet Masiri, who was his vice president and minister of finance and planning, they gelled and they complemented each other.

23:17And they served the people, holding elections every five years when many parts of Africa were under one-party leadership and dictatorship and military rule, but not Botswana. The bishop mentioned the discovery of diamonds. You can't really understand the last 30 or 40 years of Botswana without talking about diamonds. No, in fact, diamonds are still the largest part of the economy in terms of GDP. And there's a story I want to ask Susan whether this is true or not. But what I've heard is that the New York Times correspondent tipped off Soretzi that diamonds had been found. And he called the chiefs of the eight nations together and said to them, if anybody finds diamonds in the country, what I propose is that we share that equally among the people of the country, no matter what nation they belong to.

24:18And each of them would think, hmm, well, it's a one in eight chance it's on my territory, so it's probably best that I take part in this. So they all agreed to this. And a few days later, he comes along and says, guess what? They've discovered diamonds. So I don't know whether you've heard that story. Yes, I have. And whether it's true or whether it's just apocryphal. It's difficult to know. Right. But I suppose one very important dimension of this is that the discovery of diamonds was managed so well by the government. Yeah. I mean, to this day, they divide the wealth among the people in terms of health care and education and so on, but they also provide free seed and ploughing to farmers still.

25:00Until the last few years, students were funded to go abroad to bring back skills, particularly in STEM subjects, science, technology, engineering and maths. Then the government actually set up the Botswana International University of Science and Technology to produce far more graduates than you could afford to send abroad. And now they've set up a university producing about 500 graduates a year in those subjects, mainly from Botswana itself. Can we, Mike, address Botswana's location? As we've said, between South Africa, Rhodesia, a little bit of northern Rhodesia, and what's now called Namibia, all white run.

25:41And inevitably, Saretsi Kama's government intertwined, you may say, sandwiched between all of them. Advantage or disadvantage? Well, at face value, it seemed a great disadvantage. Yeah. But probably, in the long run, an advantage in terms of it being backed by other countries where it hadn't been necessarily before, including the United Kingdom. Because at that stage, Botswana had nothing in the way of a defence force, for example. And even today, you know, it has a defence force, but wouldn't be a match for South Africa, for example, if it came to it. He came just in time, didn't he, Sir Eczi?

26:20He did. He really did. He died of cancer in 1980, just a year after leading his party to a fourth general election victory. He was only 59. So he died at Statehouse on the morning of July the 13th, 1980, with his dear wife, Ruth, holding him. and when the news was given to the nation by the then acting president Masiri, so of course the whole nation just grieved and grieved. And Sarets was born on the 1st of July, 1921. So the 1st of July is a public holiday in Botswana now. And he was buried next to his ancestors at the royal family graveyard at Saroe. And years later, I was there at Lady Kama's funeral when she was buried next to her husband.

27:14When you go there, Sir Saretze Kama's grave bears a simple inscription, a favourite quotation. The world is my church to do good my religion. You wrote, Susan, that the whole country was numb with sorrow. What did you mean? Soretzi was the founding father of Botswana People have such a very strong sense of gratitude For his moral authority, for his kindness, his compassion As Bishop Mwamba has said, he never put on airs and graces He also had this wonderful sense of humour And I think it's worth mentioning Because his sense of humour was apparent on many occasions But it was a very gentle sense of humour So when, for example, Ruth was given two kittens and he immediately called them pride and prejudice.

28:11My thanks to Professor Mike Bode and also to you, Dr Susan Williams, author of Colour Bar, The Triumph of Saretzi Karma and His Nation. Goodbye.