{"id":16351,"date":"2022-11-07T17:00:06","date_gmt":"2022-11-07T17:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp"},"modified":"2022-11-07T17:57:54","modified_gmt":"2022-11-07T17:57:54","slug":"bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp","title":{"rendered":"BPF Legislator Denies Links to BDP"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Botswana. <\/strong><\/span>An MP of the opposition Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF), Leepetswe Lesedi, has blamed his rivals in Serowe South for recent rumours linking him to the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP).<\/b><\/p>\n

Speculation was rife last week that the MP would be received at a BDP rally scheduled for Shoshong last Saturday. However, the rally was abandoned at the last minute due to bad weather.<\/p>\n

This week the BPF denied reports linking the Serowe South legislator to the BDP, saying the rumours were orchestrated by his opponents with an eye on the constituency.<\/p>\n

Rivals<\/p>\n

\u201cI have no intentions of crossing the floor to the BDP and have not been approached by anyone from the party,\u201d Lesedi said in an interview.<\/p>\n

\u201cI suspect that my political rivals who have an interest in the constituency are the ones spreading these lies in order to discredit me and bring panic to my party.\u201d<\/p>\n

When the press put it to him that some opposition MPs in the past defected to the BDP having vehemently denied rumours that they would do so before, Lesedi responded: \u201cI am not like those politicians.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI am a principled representative who will not dump the people who voted for me. Besides, there is a floor crossing law that stops us from doing that. So crossing to BDP means that I would cease to be an MP because I would create a vacancy.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added that eight politicians from both the BDP and the BPF intend to run as candidates in Serowe South in the next general elections in 2024. \u201cThese are the people whom I suspect orchestrated these rumours,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Denial before defecting<\/b><\/p>\n

Other MPs who initially denied rumours linking them to the BDP but ended up crossing the floor to the ruling party include Pono Moatlhodi of Tonota and Aubrey Lesaso of Shoshong. The MPs crossed the floor before the floor crossing law was enacted.<\/p>\n

Reached for comment, BDP spokesperson Kagelelo Kentse rubbished the reports that link Lesedi to his party.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt cannot be true because the development would mean that there has to be a bye-election and that comes with a lot of expenses,\u201d Kentse said. \u201cFurther, I have not heard from our party regarding anything like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

For More News And Analysis About Botswana<\/a> Follow Africa-Press<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Botswana. An MP of the opposition Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF), Leepetswe Lesedi, has blamed his rivals in Serowe South for recent rumours linking him to the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP). Speculation was rife last week that the MP would be received at a BDP rally scheduled for Shoshong last Saturday. However, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":16350,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,7,10,12],"tags":[233,237,234],"class_list":["post-16351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-head-lines","category-parties","category-policy","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-botswana","tag-botswana"],"yoast_head":"\nBPF Legislator Denies Links to BDP - Botswana<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"An MP of the opposition Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF), Leepetswe Lesedi, has blamed his rivals in Serowe South for r ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"BPF Legislator Denies Links to BDP\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"An MP of the opposition Botswana Patriotic Front (BPF), Leepetswe Lesedi, has blamed his rivals in Serowe South for r ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Botswana\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-11-07T17:00:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-11-07T17:57:54+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/botswana\/sites\/38\/2022\/11\/postQueueImg_3-636947028c6f5.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"719\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"403\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"BPF Legislator Denies Links to BDP\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-11-07T17:00:06+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-11-07T17:57:54+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp\"},\"wordCount\":387,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/botswana\/sites\/38\/2022\/11\/postQueueImg_3-636947028c6f5.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Africa Press\",\"Africa Press-Botswana\",\"Botswana\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"head lines\",\"parties\",\"policy\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/bpf-legislator-denies-links-to-bdp\",\"name\":\"BPF Legislator Denies Links to BDP - 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