President Nelson Mandela returned from his gruelling trip to the United States and Canada on Sunday to say that he is convinced the Southern African Development Community intervention in Lesotho was the right thing to do, and the peacekeeping exercise will succeed.
Addressing a press conference in Cape Town on Sunday afternoon, a tired-looking Mandela said no one should blame Acting President Mangosuthu Buthelezi for the intervention because he had consulted himself, Deputy President Thabo Mbeki and the relevant officials. He said if it was a mistake, ”we are all involved”.
Meanwhile, in the face of a deluge of refugees from Lesotho and amid fears that renegade Lesotho Defence Force soldiers might carry out hit-and-run raids in South Africa, six border districts have been declared disaster areas.
In the Lesotho capital Maseru on Sunday, supporters of the ruling Lesotho Congress for Democracy took to the streets in a clean-up campaign. Those taking part in the clean-up ululated, whistled and sang joyously as armoured vehicles of the SADC intervention force patrolled the streets. However, not all the bystanders supported the patrolling SADC troops, with many hurling insults at them as they passed.
As Maseru started to return to normality, energy minister Monyane Moleleki said that government offices will reopen on Monday at 9am and schools will open on Wednesday.
He said a government team has just completed a video assessment of the damage. He added that while his government regretts the destruction in Maseru’s central business district, it represents an opportunity to build a better capital suited to the requirements of the 21st century. ”The city was poorly planned and built more than a hundred years ago,” he said.
Moleleki added it was fortunate that very few government buildings were destroyed and said this points to the fact that the arson was not politically motivated. Meanwhile, it will take three to four years to rebuild Maseru, but the institutional operation of the city will be functioning within a few days, he said.
An additional 400 South African reinforcement troops arrived in Maseru on Saturday, bringing the intervention force up to 1000 SA troops and 200 from Botswana. It is believed authorisation is being sought for additional reinforcements.
As intervention force troops positioned themselves to track down and disarm mutinous Lesotho Defence Force soldiers, more than 1000 LDF troops have handed themselves over. However, only a tiny fraction of them arrived armed. They were given until Monday to return to their bases with their weapons.