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Smuts?’ Seretse, with his usual good nature, simply replied, ‘I am sorry.’ But when Thompson started to interrogate him about his drinking habits, Seretse became playful in his answers:
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : When did Mrs Khama arrive here in Serowe?
    SERETSE : About 20 August.
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : I find that there was only one permit issued to her to purchase liquor. Do you know about that?
    SERETSE : Yes, I went to Mr Sullivan [the District Commissioner] for it.
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : And the permit was for one dozen bottles of beer, two bottles of some sort of liquor, three bottles of brandy and three bottles of gin. Do you remember getting that permit from Mr Sullivan?
    SERETSE : Yes.
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : Was the liquor obtained?
    SERETSE : Yes, Sir.
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : The beer as well? My information is that the beer may not have been supplied. Do you remember whether you got the beer or not?
    SERETSE : I am trying to think. I don’t know whether I got it or not.
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : The suggestion is that you got brandy instead of beer?
    SERETSE : Twelve brandies?
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : No, five brandies instead of twelve quarts of beer.
    SERETSE : No, I don’t think I got more brandy.
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : Two bottles of liqueurs, three bottles of brandy and three bottles of gin. What was that liquor intended for?
    SERETSE : It was intended for my consumption.
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : Your personal consumption? Have you still got some of it left?
    SERETSE : Unfortunately, no…
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : This liquor was intended for yourself and your wife?
    SERETSE : She hardly drinks.
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : And your visitors?
    SERETSE : I have not offered them any.
    ATTORNEY GENERAL : There is none left?
    SERETSE : I am afraid not.
    At this point, Harragin interjected with a general remark; he was clearly embarrassed by Thompson’s rude battery of questions and wanted to close it down.
    Then, with a dry irony that he knew Seretse would appreciate, Harragin turned to his marriage:
    You then did something – which we now know was getting married – which in effect the Regent or your guardian was suggesting was so serious that you could not, or should not, be designated as Chief, much in the same way as if you had committed murder or something.
    At the June Kgotla, Harragin went on, the tribe ‘rose as a man and said, “We will have Seretse and his wife” – whether she is a white or a green one.’ It was clear that Harragin sided with Seretse – not only in his clash with the Attorney General, but in his confrontation with the British Government.
    Thompson raised the issue of South Africa. Given that the Protectorate’s capital, Mafikeng, was in the Union, he asked, how could Seretse – as a prohibited immigrant – function as chief? But it ought to be possible to set up alternative arrangements, countered Seretse. Being a prohibited immigrant, he added, meant that he was not very different from practically every black South African – ‘because even in the Union itself African people are practically prohibited immigrants; they cannot move from one part of the Union to another without some sort of permission from the Native Commissioner’. In any case, he shrewdly pointed out, South Africa was irrelevant to the Inquiry – the Secretary of State had said so.
    When Ellenberger, who had been carefully briefed by the High Commissioner’s Office, was called as a witness, he returned to the issue of South Africa. He argued that the Bangwato required ‘very strong’ leadership and the ‘closest contact’ with the Administration, so their Chief would need to be able to go to Mafikeng. He added that the Protectorate needed to import food from the Union and was dependent upon the export of cattle; in addition, families were dependent on funds from men working in the Union. He was asked about the political views of the Union and of Southern Rhodesia