A few weeks ago I travelled to Selebi Phikwe to bury a friend I had known and grown up with since 1990. Whilst he didn’t leave a note explaining why he had decided to take his life, we cannot downplay how him being retrenched last year played a part in his decision.

Coincidentally he took his life in Phikwe, a town now seemingly dying; a town we grew up in which was strong and proud but due to the closing of the BCL Mine by the Government is now sad, desolate and possesses many a story of resulting suicides.

During the week of the funeral, at the memorials and in conversations; it generally struck me how many people have been affected by retrenchments and layoffs in a country where growth has been stagnant for the past 10 years. The Global Financial Crisis had nothing to do with Botswana but due to our over-dependency on minerals, we were affected very badly in the last 10 years: growth slowed and stalled in China, Europe and the US meaning prices of copper, nickel, diamonds etc all fell and this hit us hard as a country. Therefore where we are now in terms of unemployment and a poor economy cannot be placed squarely at the feet of our decision makers as this is an epidemic across the whole world.

That said, in my opinion our response to the Crisis (as a country and as businesses) could probably have been better. As a society we have struggled to accept the harsh realities and challenges that came with the Crisis and the behavioural changes needed to truly combat this scourge. At a Government level our budgeting style and priorities haven’t really changed. Our political style has been to avoid true structural changes to our economy. We have stuck to our NDPs and have avoided taking an approach to expenditure which focuses on value and cost containment.

In corporate Botswana, the same is true. The ten years leading to 2008 were fantastic in corporate Botswana with most businesses making a killing with very little need for innovation and efficiency. Almost all companies and parastatals have had some form of retrenchments in the past 10 years.

Unfortunately Capitalism dictates that growth to profits must be attained year on year, regardless of the economy or the effects of this chase for growth. Whilst shareholders become happy, their dividends growing, managers in companies receive decent bonuses, unemployment is rising and depending on other factors some choose to make the ultimate decision to commit suicide. This is the true cost of some of these exercises and unfortunately this is the side that never gets reported or discussed in board rooms and shareholder meetings.

Sitting at the memorial in Phikwe, hearing about his retrenchment and those of others made me realise we cannot continue to do business as is in Botswana. We really need to find more innovative ways to finding growth or to reduce our growth expectations.

(Controversial aside: Whether you agreed with President Khama or not at the time, faced by the public service sector strike advocating for a 16% increase in salaries (even though our economy was facing its worst times since independence) his decision to freeze salaries and avoid retrenchments rather than the World Bank recommendation of cutting the work force then improving salaries of the remaining employees was very empathetic (all else equal)).

A more social approach to business is now needed.

To avoid widespread unemployment and the effects we see on our families’ and friends all stakeholders must take some pain and compromise. We need some version of the below:

1. Unions and their members must accept salary freezes (or even decreases if need be)

2. Managements must forgo performance bonuses

3. Shareholders must accept less dividends.

These compromises would be painful to all but would be a better collective decision than the current model of unions demanding cost of living increases then “forcing” managements and shareholders to have to reduce the salary/wage bill.

But I know this is an unrealistic dream. But this dream could have saved my friend. It might have saved all those BCL employees and many more from all the companies which have retrenched in the past 10 years.