Africa-Press – Lesotho. One of Lesotho’s richest people is set to become the southern African mountain kingdom’s prime minister after his upstart party swept elections, falling just short of the country’s first parliamentary majority in more than a decade.
Sam Matekane’s months-old Revolution for Prosperity gained 56 of 120 seats in last week’s election, according to results released on Monday, after the All Basotho Convention that had headed Lesotho’s ruling coalition was routed.
Matekane, a diamond magnate, has said he wants to prevent the enclave of about 2mn people which is surrounded by South African territory from becoming a “failed state”.
Instability in Lesotho has at times spread beyond its borders, with politically connected gangs from the country linked to illegal gold mining in South Africa. More than 50 parties contested the elections and Matekane is in the strongest position in years to form a government.
With a turnout of just 37 per cent, the election reflected widespread unhappiness with years of dysfunctional coalition governments that have failed to overhaul a stagnant economy.
Matekane only launched his party this year but drew in a former governor of Lesotho’s central bank and other professionals as candidates and promised to revive foreign investment in the economy.
The businessman made his fortune as a contractor for Lesotho’s Letšeng diamond mine, which has the world’s highest deposits of the gems. London-listed Gem Diamonds owns most of Letšeng, while the state has a 30 per cent stake.
Matekane has said that if he becomes prime minister, he will step back from his business interests to avoid conflict. The next government will be under pressure from donors and the Southern African Development Community, a regional bloc, to revive flagging constitutional reforms but analysts say that resistance is strong.
“The same people who would pass the reforms would be the ones whose power would be gutted by it,” said John Aerni-Flessner, an associate professor and historian of Lesotho at Michigan State University.
Moeketsi Majoro, the outgoing prime minister, declared a state of emergency in August in order to recall parliament to pass the political reforms. The constitutional court threw it out.
The judges said that since the onset of multi-party democracy in 1993, Lesotho has been mired in “convulsions of instability caused by a cocktail of factors such as politicisation of the public service and security services by the political class”.
Lesotho suffers the highest rate of homicides in Africa, at more than 40 per 100,000 people. Worldwide only a handful of South American and Caribbean countries have higher levels.
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