Flying for Per Diems, Not the People

MOTSAMAI MOKOTJO

“If the politics are not appropriate, nothing else will work,” said a brother the other day.

Such statements are against the purpoted trip by a delegation of Lesotho ministers to negotiate with US President Donald Trump’s administration after it slapped our country 50 percent tariff on goods and services from the Kingdom.

Whatever the rationale for the hike, does it make sense for ministers of finance, foreign affairs, and trade to board a plane to Washington when there are applications that can be used to hold meetings virtually?

During the COVID-19 era, when travel was barred, ministers and government officials attended meetings remotely.

It’s only in banana republics where ministers feel the need to receive per diems for absolutely doing nothing.

Did Mexico and Canada, neighbors of the US, fly to DC after they were also included in the barrage by Trump?

Respecting Basotho is an alien concept and painfully difficult for elites in this country to comprehend.

The Consolidated Report on the Annual Budget and Estimates of Revenue and Expenditure for the Financial Year 2025/2026 presented by the Economic and Development Cluster noted: “The Ministry of Finance budget of M19.2 million for international trips seemed unreasonably on the high end without a clear calendar of the statutory international meetings to be undertaken. The Committee noted that the budget allocation in 2023/24 was M5 million and increased radically in 2024/25 to M15.6 million.”

Yet a delegation made up of three ministers intends to board planes to North America. 

Malawian President Lazarus Chakwera is a serial flyer of note; thus, many of my friends in that part of the continent are furious with the amount of international trips.

Our ministers want to Chakwera their way to Washington when there are platforms to communicate their grievances?

Prudent public spending of funds remains a foreign idea to our leaders.

Some may want to be swayed that the government officials are acting in public interest, but the term is broad since I assert that theirs is purely a commercial activity to get per diems.

One was also reminded of Frantz Fanon in The Wretched of the Earth in noting that, “Now the political education of the masses is seen to be a historic necessity.”

Citizens have a fiduciary duty to question irresponsible spending of its funds when there are alternative ways of engaging with other leaders from different countries.

Fanon also warns, “The state, which by its strength and discretion ought to inspire confidence and disarm and lull everybody to sleep, on the contrary, seeks to impose itself in spectacular fashion. It makes a display; it jostles people and bullies them, thus intimating to the citizen that he is in continual danger.”

It is such that critiquing this ad hominem trip should be condemned with the strongest words it deserves.

“The 2025/26 budget is anchored on fiscal prudence, economic growth, and social protection. We continue to allocate more resources to investment spending, underscoring our government’s commitment to infrastructure and economic transformation, while remaining mindful of the need to prudently manage recurrent expenditure, particularly the wage bill,” Dr Retšelisitsoe Matlanyane said when delivering the budget earlier this year.

What is prudent about taking an international when you can simply hold a meeting via Zoom or Microsoft Teams?

I was listening to Fela Kuti’s Authority Stealing when writing this piece.

The rendition goes like: “Na worker go waka for them/Authority people them go dey steal/Public contribute plenty money/Na Authority people dey steal/ Authority man no dey pickpocket/Na petty cash him dey pick/Armed robber him need gun/Authority man him need pen/Him need gun/him need pen/Pen got power gun no get/If gun steal eighty thousand naira/Pen go steal two billion naira.”

I have spoken my peace!