{"id":82785,"date":"2026-04-06T10:26:32","date_gmt":"2026-04-06T10:26:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/opposition-pins-hope-on-referendum"},"modified":"2026-04-06T10:26:32","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T10:26:32","slug":"opposition-pins-hope-on-referendum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/opposition-pins-hope-on-referendum","title":{"rendered":"Opposition Pins Hope on Referendum"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"ap-article-header-tag\">           <strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Botswana. <\/strong>         <\/span><b>Opposition parties in Botswana are pinning their hopes on a forthcoming referendum to overturn the recently passed Constitutional Amendment Bill, which seeks to establish a Constitutional Court. Despite strong resistance from minority parties and civic organizations, Parliament approved the bill on Monday.<\/b><\/p>\n<p>MINORITY PARTIES EYE REFERENDUM<\/p>\n<p>Reacting to the bill\u2019s passage in an interview with The Botswana Gazette, Mabuse Pule, leader of the minority parties in Parliament, said the opposition is now focused on the upcoming referendum, which will allow voters to decide whether the Constitutional Court should be established.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cParties opposed to the bill will now start campaigning to tell Batswana to vote \u2018No\u2019. We want a holistic constitutional review, not the piecemeal approach the Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC) is imposing on Batswana,\u201d Pule said urging Batswana to vote no.<\/p>\n<p>HOPE AMIDST PARLIAMENTARY CONTROL<\/p>\n<p>Opposition whip Caterpillar Hikuama expressed cautious optimism about the referendum outcome. He said the bill\u2019s passage was largely due to Parliament being under firm control, leaving little room for UDC MPs to oppose their leadership, even if some personally disagreed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI am hopeful that Batswana will vote \u2018No\u2019 in the referendum. The bill managed to pass because the parliamentary system is controlled. I don\u2019t think Batswana will give a thumb-up to the establishment of a Constitutional Court given the current economic challenges facing the country,\u201d Hikuama said.<\/p>\n<p>PUBLIC CONSIDERATIONS<\/p>\n<p>Hikuama urged voters to consider why civic organizations, Dikgosi, opposition parties, and other stakeholders opposed the bill before casting their votes in the referendum. He also highlighted concerns about the process followed during the constitutional review, pointing to what he called \u201cred flags\u201d that should not be ignored.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBefore voting in the referendum, Batswana must ask themselves why so many key stakeholders opposed the bill, and reflect on the concerns raised during the constitutional review process,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>The opposition\u2019s campaign ahead of the referendum is expected to become a key battleground for public opinion on the Constitutional Court and the broader constitutional reform process.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ap-article-footer-note\">           Find more news and analyses on           <span class=\"ap-highlight-country\">Botswana<\/span>           on the           <span class=\"ap-highlight-brand\">Africa Press<\/span>           website         <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Botswana. Opposition parties in Botswana are pinning their hopes on a forthcoming referendum to overturn the recently passed Constitutional Amendment Bill, which seeks to establish a Constitutional Court. Despite strong resistance from minority parties and civic organizations, Parliament approved the bill on Monday. MINORITY PARTIES EYE REFERENDUM Reacting to the bill\u2019s passage in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":82784,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,7,10,244],"tags":[234],"class_list":["post-82785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-head-lines","category-parties","category-to-homepage","tag-botswana"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Opposition Pins Hope on Referendum - Botswana<\/title>\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\/opposition-pins-hope-on-referendum\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Opposition Pins Hope on Referendum\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Africa-Press &#8211; Botswana. Opposition parties in Botswana are pinning their hopes on a forthcoming referendum to overturn the recently passed Constitutional Amendment Bill, which seeks to establish a Constitutional Court. Despite strong resistance from minority parties and civic organizations, Parliament approved the bill on Monday. 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