07 Sep 2017

In the said article, the Attorney General Advocate Abraham M. Keetshabe is said to have made an undertaking to President Khama at a Cabinet meeting stating that:
 
a)    Cabinet Ministers are free from Prosecution as long as he is the Attorney General.

b)    That this is said to have taken place at a meeting of Cabinet which the President, His Excellency Lieutenant General Dr Seretse Khama Ian Khama attended.

In response to the said allegations and report, kindly note that the Attorney General hereby makes a rebuttal of the aforesaid allegations in the following terms:

1.    That the Attorney General denies in no uncertain terms the correctness of the aforegoing allegations and report in its entirety; and states categorically that he never made such an undertaking or said anything to the like effect.
2.    That no such statement was ever made and hence Cabinet could never have been shocked as alleged.

3.    That public prosecution of anybody in this entire country is the province of the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions by reason of the powers vested in him by Section 51 (A) (3) of the Constitution of the Republic of Botswana.

4.    That the Director of Public Prosecutions is the dominus litis in all matters of public prosecution and ancillaries in terms of the Section 51 (A) (6) of the Constitution of the Republic of Botswana which clearly and in no uncertain terms states that, “...the Director of Public Prosecutions shall not be subject to the direction or control of any other person or authority” in the exercise of his prosecutorial mandate and functions.

5.    That the Attorney General has no prosecutorial powers and/or functions and therefore can never ever make such a statement anywhere.

For the above reasons, even in consideration of the administrative supervision of the Attorney General over the Director of Public Prosecutions, this has no bearing on the decision by the DPP on whether any person should be prosecuted or not, this being the exclusive preserve of the Director of Public Prosecutions.

In view of this constitutionally entrenched legal position, it is not possible for the Attorney General to make such an undertaking. In this regard, it is clear that the article is a consequence of extended malice or gross ignorance on the part of the Gazette Newspaper and its journalists.

It is therefore being denied that either such an undertaking was made by the Attorney General to the person of the President and his Cabinet at the alleged meeting or to any other person at any forum or occasion. BGCIS