SWAZI YOUTH STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM

More than 100 young people from Swaziland went to the 17th World Festival of Youth and Students to report on the struggle against the monarchy of King Mswati III, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch.

And they said they fear possible arrest when they return to Swaziland, because they attended the festival, The Militant newspaper, New York, reports.

More than 200 delegates attended a workshop about that fight for democracy in Swaziland at the festival in Pretoria, South Africa,

Militant reports, Pius Vilakati, 28, a student who led several marches protesting government cuts in education earlier this year, described how the police told him to ‘stop these demonstrations and threatened me’.

Vilakati told the story of Sipho Jele, who had been arrested along with others at a May Day demonstration for wearing T-shirts with the acronym PUDEMO.

The Peoples United Democratic Movement, the main opposition group in Swaziland, is banned. Jele died in police custody.

Shortly after speaking at the funeral for Jele, Vilakati learned police planned to arrest him and he managed to escape to South Africa.

Students from South Africa, Lesotho, Namibia, and Mozambique joined the discussion on how to support the fight for democratic rights in Swaziland. Many said they had not known of the repressive conditions in the kingdom.

THAT WAS THE SWAZI YEAR THAT WAS

Action for Southern Africa (ACTSA) has published this ‘review of 2010’ in the latest edition (Winter 2010) of its quarterly magazine ACTSA News: ‘Focus on Swaziland’.

Throughout 2010 the efforts of progressive forces in Swaziland to campaign for democracy and rights have been met with an increasing brutality.

In January student protests against education funding cuts were met with a heavy handed response. Colleges and the University were shut down, students were detained, and the police were accused of opening fire on protesters and torturing a prisoner who had been detained for taking photos.

On 1 May ‘non-workers’ who attempted to attend a workers day rally were arrested. All were well known activists who had been invited to speak at the event. One rally attendee, Sipho Jele, was detained for wearing a t-shirt promoting the banned political party PUDEMO. He was later found dead in a police cell. Police have claimed that Jele committed suicide, however, an independent forensic pathologist’s report found no signs of suicide.

In June, the International Labour Organisation criticised Swaziland’s human rights record. The Government responded by raiding the homes of union activists.

In September, police raided a meeting of pro democracy supporters in a Manzini hotel, arresting nearly 50 individuals. Foreign nationals in the group were questioned and forcibly deported, and a number of Swazi campaigners were detained and interrogated. Swaziland’s Prime Minister Barnabas Dlamini later threatened foreign pro democracy activists who visit the country with torture.

In spite of increased harassment and intimidation, the resolve of pro democracy campaigners in Swaziland has not weakened. In November activists marched through the streets of the capital Mbabane to highlight their calls for democracy and rights and oppose forced evictions and demolitions in a number of suburban communities.

PM MISLEADS ILO ON JELE INQUEST

Barnabas Dlamini, Swaziland’s illegally-appointed Prime Minister, reportedly told a delegation from the International Labour Organisation (ILO) that the report on the inquest on Sipho Jele was ‘eagerly awaited’.

The report was ‘imminent’ and as soon as the report was ready the ILO would be among the first to get a copy, he promised.

Doesn’t he sound a reasonable chap? Readers will know that Jele was at a May Day rally this year and all of a sudden the Swazi security forces hauled him in. Within days he had died in government custody.

An inquest was started and before we knew it police and prison officers were shown to be liars. A documents about Jele’s arrest had been forged and an independent pathologist cast doubts on the Swazi state’s official line that Jele had committed suicide.

The international community took an interest in Jele’s case. And then, all of a sudden the inquest was adjourned with no date set for it to be resumed.

And that’s where we stand.

The inquest hasn’t ended and there’s no plan to finish it.

Now, what is that Dlamini has just told the ILO? The publication of the inquest report is imminent. Sorry but that sounds like an outright lie to me. The report cannot be ready because the inquest isn’t over. Never mind about publishing a report, many of us would simply settle at the moment for the inquest to be resumed.

Prime Minister Dlamini must think we are fools. He can’t get away with telling any old rubbish to the ILO in the hope that they would take his word for it.

And what do the Swazi media think they are up to by reporting Dlamini’s statement as if it were true, after they devoted so much attention to Jele’s inquest while it was running.

CALL FOR HUMAN RIGHTS SPREADS

Opposition to the human rights catastrophe in Swaziland is growing in neighbouring South Africa.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) wants the Secretary-General of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Parliamentary Forum, Dr. Esau Chiviya, to convene an urgent meeting to discuss the spate of recent human rights abuses occurring in Swaziland.

Swaziland, ruled by King Mswati III, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch, is in the grip of a reign of terror unleashed by the state against pro-democracy activists.

In May 2010 Sipho Jele, an activist for the People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO), died while in custody. Pro-democracy activists fear he was murdered. An inquest into Jele’s death was opened and has now been adjourned indefinitely.

Jele had been arrested for wearing a T-shirt with a PUDEMO logo. Calls from civil society in Swaziland for an independent investigation into his death, have been met with silence by the Swazi government.

This month, the Swazi police arrested a member of the Swaziland Youth Congress (SWAYOCO), Sibusiso Mhlanga, for possessing a copy of a City Press article, that detailed a sex scandal involving the Swazi Royal Family.

All news of the scandal has been suppressed in the Swazi media, but South African newspapers, which also circulate in Swaziland, have carried reports. DA called this, ‘an ominous action amidst allegations against the Swazi authorities of police brutality of activists whilst in detention’.

The DA said in a statement, ‘Both these instances are indicative of a society that lives under an oppressive regime, that of King Mswati III, who denies his citizens what are, in essence, their most basic of human rights.’

The DA wants South African President Jacob Zuma to discuss these ‘very serious human rights violations’ at the SADC Heads of State meeting in Windhoek. ‘The DA believes that it is time for the South African government to demonstrate its leadership in the region and re-affirm our commitment to human rights.’

HISTORY AND POLITICS IN SWAZILAND

This is taken from Peter Kenworthy’s Stiffkitten blogsite, 7 August 2010.

Swaziland, the last autocratic monarchy in Africa, is a country in an almost constant state of crisis. The repeated human rights violations and harassment of the Swazi democracy movement by the Swazi regime, the huge inequalities between a small Swazi elite and the poor majority, and an Aids prevalence rate of over 40% should make newspapers and governments around the world react. In recent months the house of the Swaziland United Democratic Front National Organising Secretary has been bombed, maybe by the Swazi police; the President of the Swaziland Federation of Trade Unions has has his house searched by no less than 12 police officers; the leader of the largest opposition party, PUDEMO, Mario Masuku has been charged with acts of terrorism for speaking his mind and is more or less constantly harassed by police; student leader Pius Vilakati has gone missing after having been attempted abducted by police; and human rights activist and PUDEMO member Sipho Jele died in police custody, probably at the hands of the police.

But these stories are rarely if ever covered by the foreign media or condemned by world leaders or governments and the historic background to Swaziland's present situation is more or less unknown.

This article will therefore give a brief historical overview of Swaziland and comment on the situation.

To read the full article click here.