SWAZI WEB CENSORSHIP NO SURPRISE

The Swaziland Government should admit it is censoring the website of the kingdom’s main opposition group, PUDEMO.

Last week I reported that the site had been blocked in Swaziland (although it is available everywhere else in the free world).

Nelsiwe Shongwe, Swazi Minister of Information, Communications and Technology, denied knowing anything about the censorship and said the website was probably just experiencing a ‘glitch’ or ‘malfunction’.

The truth is there is no ‘malfunction’, the site has been censored – and that can only be done with the government’s permission.

There is only one cable by which internet in Swaziland connects to the outside world. That is through the line that Swaziland Post and Telecommunications Corporation (SPTC), which is responsible to the Swazi Government, owns, and that runs to South Africa. SPTC is controlled by the government, so the government is responsible.

Shongwe says she knew nothing about the blocking. As minster responsible she should have known. If she really did not know then she is an incompetent minister. If she did know but denies it, she is a liar. In any case once she was told the PUDEMO site was blocked, she should have immediately instructed its unblocking.

Shongwe and her friends in the Swaziland Government that controls most of the media in the kingdom ruled by King Mswati III, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch, are now moving their tentacles onto the Internet. We shouldn’t be surprised by this as the warning signs have been showing for some time.

In August 2010, Shongwe told the senate that the government was looking at laws to control cyberspace.

In July 2010, King Mswati complained about ‘misleading’ information about Swaziland on the Internet.

Last month (November 2010), Barnabas Dlamini, Swaziland’s illegally-appointed Prime Minister, said the government daily monitors the Internet for damaging postings against the kingdom.

Blocking freedom of speech is, of course, outlawed by the Swaziland Constitution. But they don’t care about that.

See also

SWAZILAND CENSORSHIP GOES GLOBAL

COME CLEAN ON WEB CENSORSHIP

SWAZI STATE ‘MONITORS INTERNET’

READ THE TRUTH ABOUT SWAZILAND

SWAZI KING AND INTERNET INSULTS

INTERNET TRUTH ABOUT SWAZILAND

SWAZI SENATORS ATTACK FACEBOOK

MEDIA FREEDOM IN SWAZILAND

FIND NEWS AND VIEWS ON SWAZILAND

SWAZILAND CENSORSHIP GOES GLOBAL

The Swaziland Government has scored another own goal in its attempt to be seen by the international community as a responsible nation worthy of First World status.

As I reported last week, the government has blocked the website of the People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO). This is the first time the Swazi regime, led by King Mswati III, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch, has censored the Internet, although it controls most of the media in the kingdom itself.

The story of the Swazi Government’s crass action to ban free speech has now gone global as this report from the international news agency AFP demonstrates.

SOURCE

Swaziland opposition says website blocked by government

(AFP) – 7 December 2010

JOHANNESBURG — A banned Swaziland opposition party on Tuesday said the government had blocked access to its website, which had been hosting a poll on whether the kingdom should hold multi-party elections.

The People's United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO) said the government of the small southern African monarchy had "made good on its promise to censor cyberspace" by blocking access to its site, pudemo.org.

"What is clear... is that the Swazi regime is intent on extending its censorship policy into cyberspace," PUDEMO said in a statement.

"Due to the fact that the website is not hosted within the country, it is still accessible everywhere outside the country," it added.

Political organisations have been banned by law since 1973 in Swaziland, which is known for the lavish lifestyles of 42-year-old King Mswati III and his 13 wives.

PUDEMO's website last month launched a poll on whether the country should hold multi-party elections to choose the members of its House of Assembly.

Fifty-seven percent of the 831 people who voted in the online poll said they preferred multi-party elections to the current tinkhundla electoral system, based on constituent chiefdoms and seen as tightly controlled by the king.

"It is not clear whether the new results of the poll are related to the blocking of the website or not," PUDEMO said.

Swaziland's government is known for cracking down on political activists and pro-democracy campaigners.

Prime Minister Barnabas Dlamini, a hardline royalist, said in September his government would consider punishing political dissidents by beating their feet with spikes.

See also these posts from Swazi Media Commentary.

COME CLEAN ON WEB CENSORSHIP

SWAZI STATE ‘MONITORS INTERNET’

READ THE TRUTH ABOUT SWAZILAND

SWAZI KING AND INTERNET INSULTS

INTERNET TRUTH ABOUT SWAZILAND

SWAZI SENATORS ATTACK FACEBOOK

MEDIA FREEDOM IN SWAZILAND

FIND NEWS AND VIEWS ON SWAZILAND

NEW ATTACK ON PRESS FREEDOM

Press freedom is once again under attack in Swaziland as a Swazi senator called for a ‘stringent’ law to ‘deal’ with the media.

And the Minister for Information, Communications and Technology Nelsiwe Shongwe has said her ministry was doing something about the concern, but she was not specific.

The Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) reports that Senator Themba Msibi, a former Minister for Information, told a session of parliament that ‘enacting a stringent law will deal with the journalists once and for all’.

Msibi was making a submission during a debate over a newspaper article in which it was said a journalist with the Times of Swaziland misquoted the Senate President, Gelane Zwane, during a previous Senate seating.

He said asking the media to apologise for wrong articles does not help ‘because they will continue doing this. This is not a mistake but they are doing it purposely.’

During the same debate the Senate President Zwane herself verbally attacked the Times' journalist, Arthur Mordaunt, who was also present in Parliament to cover the proceedings.

MISA said an angry Zwane accused Mordaunt of having a vendetta against her and she went on to threaten the journalist.

‘I have been watching you very closely and I have realized that ever since you started writing about me you are always writing negatively. If you want to survive in your journalism career you should immediately stop it,’ Zwane was reported to have said.

She went on to say that had it not been for the fact that she was not an ordinary member of society, she would have already done something to Mordaunt and expressed in SiSwati [the language of Swaziland] something to the effect that she would have already set her ‘dogs’ upon Mordaunt to ‘tear’ the journalist apart.

In a statement, MISA Swaziland chapter said the threats not only constitute a serious attack on press freedom, but it is also plain abuse of parliamentary privilege by the senators.

MISA Swaziland National Director Comfort Mabuza said MISA Swaziland rejects the call by Senator Msibi for a law to regulate the media. He said such a call was out of place and inconsistent with the kingdom’s constitution and the universal principles of media freedom and also goes against a 1997 Parliamentary resolution to have the media regulate themselves.