BOTSWANA: Academic freedom under threat

On February 19, days before he was due to present a paper entitled "Presidential succession in Botswana: No model for Africa", Professor Kenneth Good found three men on his doorstep with handcuffs. Telling the 72-year-old, who lives alone with his teenage daughter, that they had a "message from the president", they explained that he was a "prohibited immigrant" and had 48 hours to leave the country, where he has lived for 15 years. The paper Good was due to present, with fellow academic Ian Taylor, was a critique of growing autocracy in Africa. Filing a High Court petition, Good won a stay of his deportation until an appeal can be heard on March 7. His lawyer, human-rights advocate Duma Boko, has since received a death threat. For more information, email <mr@survival-international.org>.

From Green Left Weekly, March 2, 2005.

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From GLW issue 617