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Basutoland: 1868-1966
The Sotho score several notable successes against the Cape military (most
notably an ambush at Qalabani in 1880). An uneasy truce in 1881 does little
to resolve the conflict.
The British high commissioners leave largely intact the tribal structures of the
Sotho, among whom many minor chiefs owe allegiance to a single paramount
chief (a role invariably filled by a descendant of Moshoeshoe).
Independence: from1966
In 1991, after another military coup, the new junta promises to introduce a
democratic constitution. A general election in 1993 at last brings the
Basutoland Congress Party to power in a landslide victory (winning all 65
seats in the national assembly). Moshoeshoe II and his eldest son, Letsie III,
alternate on the throne during this troubled period as they side with rival
factions.
Internal disputes within the BCP disrupt the second half of the 1990s, when
there is at last a friendly democratic government in South Africa.
In 1996 a dissident faction within the BCP tries to oust its leader, the prime
For elections in 1998 Mokhele's place is taken by his former deputy prime
minister, Pakalitha Mosisili. Under his guidance the new party is almost as
overwhelmingly successful as its predecessor five years previously. The LCD
wins seventy-eight of the eighty seats in an expanded national assembly.