BOGUS SWAZILAND TERROR FEARS

When will the Times of Swaziland stop insulting the intelligence of its readers over al-Qaeda terrorist threats in the kingdom?

The Times and its companion newspapers have been running articles designed to raise the level of fear among Swazis that they are in immediate threat from ‘Asians’ or ‘Muslims’ who are secretly in Swaziland plotting destruction.

The latest episode in this fantasy comes in the Times today (26 January 2010). The newspaper reports that the Muslim cleric Sheikh Abdullah el-Faisal has been in Swaziland ‘recruiting young men who would act as suicide bombers during the FIFA Football World Cup to be hosted by South Africa in June’.

These so-called ‘suicide bombers’ are, the Times tells us, ‘Muslim extremists who would cause terror at the upcoming world showpiece’.

And what’s the Times’ evidence for this? It copied the story down from the City Press newspaper in South Africa.

And where did the City Press get the story? It copied it down from the Sunday Standard newspaper in Botswana.

Do the remember the Standard? Obviously the journalists at the Times don’t. The Standard is the newspaper that in early 2009 told us that al Qaeda terrorists may be in Swaziland disguised as secondhand car salesmen.

They weren’t and they aren’t.

The Standard went further and reported that al Qaeda terrorists were infiltrating Botswana and 10 nations across the world, ‘Brazil, Namibia, South Africa, Malaysia, Venezuela, Bolivia, Lesotho, Mauritius, Swaziland, and Trinidad and Tobago’.

Nonsense. But the Swaziland journalists fell for it (that time it was mainly the Swazi Observer).

Still the Swazi journalists don’t stop and think. They are going great damage to ‘Asians’ and ‘Muslims’ by spreading a fear that they may be terrorists.

They are also playing into the hands of the repressive regime led by King Mswati III, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch. Every time the media raise fear it gives the anti-democratic supporters of the king the excuse to clamp down on legitimate dissent in the kingdom.

RACISM AND THE 'TIMES OF SWAZILAND'

Racist hysteria has gripped one section of the Swazi press following the claim that a group of Asian members of al Qaeda are hiding in Swaziland.

Vusi Sibisi, a top columnist of the Times of Swaziland, the kingdom’s only independent newspaper, makes the absurd claim that Swazis ‘should be very much afraid’ of Asians in their midst.

He writes, ‘Initially the response likely to be triggered by the news that we might have terrorists within our midst is alarm and panic accompanied by the pungent smell of fear. And we should be very much afraid because we do not know what the mission of these terrorists is or if they are merely using this country as a hideout or a launch pad for their murderous missions.’

He then goes on to claim that ‘the frightening inward flood of Asians’ into Swaziland over the past few years has infiltrated ‘every fibre of Swazi society within every nook and cranny of this country to the extent that by and large they have become the second citizens – far better treated than the majority of the people’.

He then goes on to talk of Asians ‘flooding’ the kingdom and bringing nothing of value in terms of investments.

Complete and utter rubbish of course, and Sibisi, who has a fine record of speaking up for democracy and writing against the ruling class in Swaziland, should know better.

Asians are treated just as badly as Swazis by the ruling elite and have no special privileges.

The Swazi media have an inglorious history of racism and have many times attacked Muslims. They have also allowed the arch racist and businessman Walter Bennett space to peddle his own filth against immigrants.

One of the main ‘concerns’ of the racists is that the Asian immigrants run small businesses (‘fish and chip shop businesses’ they call them in Swaziland) and the implication is that they are taking away businesses that Swazis could do.

I’ll leave it to you to decide whether local Swazis would be setting up the businesses if the Asians weren’t there.