CHIEF MAKES WOMAN IN PANTS STRIP

One of King Mswati III’s chiefs reportedly stripped a woman of her clothing in the middle of a Swazi street in full view of the public because she was wearing trousers.

Nhlonipho Nkamane Mkhatswa is chief of Lwandle in Manzini, the main commercial city Swaziland, ruled by King Mswati, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch.

A reader of this blog writes to me that on Monday (13 December 2010) the chief, ‘indecently assaulted, humiliated and totally degraded a woman in the area by stripping her naked at a bus stop for being dressed in a pair of trousers in “his area” at a time where the Incwala ceremony is going on in the country.’

Incwala is a ceremony that King Mswati holds every year to sanctify the kingship.

The chief, who is employed as a soldier, and like all chiefs in Swaziland is the representative of King Mswati in his chiefdom, unwittingly exposes the king as a liar of international proportions. As I reported in September 2010, King Mswati misled the General Assembly of the United Nations when he praised the part his women subjects played in Swazi life. He told the UN that Swaziland ‘continued to promote equality’ in all sectors of the kingdom.

I said at the time he talked rubbish and now I am proved right.

I also wrote before about how three women in Dvokolwako in Swaziland had been summoned by ‘traditional authorities’ for wearing trousers after elders in the area had banned them. One woman said someone reported her after she was spotted wearing jeans as she was walking to the shops. Another woman was said to be wearing pants at her home when she was charged.

In Swaziland women are traditionally regarded as ‘minors’ and they are in effect owned by men, most usually their husbands or fathers. They have no rights and like small children they aren’t even allowed to decide which clothes to wear.

That’s the reality of life for women in Swaziland, even though since 2005 women have constitutional rights, but chiefs ignore them. Section 29 (3) of the Swaziland Constitution states, ‘a woman shall not be compelled to undergo or uphold any custom to which she is in conscience opposed’. That means she can wear trousers if she wants to. By law.

Chief Nhlonipho Nkamane Mkhatswa has form when it comes to bullying his way around Lwandle. Last month (November 2010), to the distress of her family and friends, he ordered that the deceased Ms. Dudu Sithole, had to be buried at night. Sithole had been a member of the banned organisations, the Swaziland Youth Congress (SWAYOCO) and the Peoples United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO).

Chief Nhlonipho Nkamane Mkhatswa, who is said to rule the Lwandle area with an ‘iron fist’, in June 2010 summoned Bhekinkhosi Dlamini, a senior activist in PUDEMO before the Inner Council of the Elwandle Royal Residence to answer why he officiated at the funeral of democracy activist Sipho Jele.

In 2005, the chief threatened the family of Vusi Shongwe, a PUDEMO member with eviction from the chiefdom after Shongwe was arrested on suspicion of involvement in the spate of petrol bottle attacks that took place in the kingdom in 2005-2006.

My correspondent writes that people in Lwandle learnt of Mkhatswa’s attack on the woman with ‘great shock, disgust and anger’.

My correspondent adds, ‘Mkhatshwa’s actions need to be condemned in the strongest of terms and exposed to the world for the fool and backward airhead he is.’

And so say all of us.

WOMEN SUFFER FROM MALE HIV POLICY

Women in Swaziland are reporting that men who have been circumcised as part of the government’s anti-HIV drive are refusing to use condoms during sex because they believe the ‘snip’ means it is impossible for them to spread the virus.

Many of the women did not realise that men who have recently been circumcised must not have sex for six weeks after the operation.

And six in ten women believe they will be victims of gender violence, because men would refuse to use condoms after being circumcised.

These are some of the findings in a report published this month (December 2010) by the Women’s HIV Prevention Tracking Project (WHiPT).

WHiPT, a project that brings community perspectives, particularly women’s voices, to the forefront of the HIV and AIDS response, concluded that the Swazi Government was ignoring the impact its circumcision policy was having on women in the kingdom.

There has been much reported about how male circumcision can supposedly reduce the risk of spreading HIV. In Swaziland, the Government has whole-heartedly bought into the idea that all sexually-active males should get the snip, even though there is ample evidence that circumcision doesn’t prevent the spread of HIV, or at best it makes no difference one way or another.

The WHiPT report called Making Medical Male Circumcision Work for Women is believed to be the first attempt to find out from Swazi women what their experiences are with men who have been circumcised.

WHiPT says that although the Swaziland Government’s policy of male circumcision includes monitoring and evaluating how the policy is working there is nothing in place to see whether women are benefiting, being harmed or not being affected at all, by the policy.

WHiPT interviewed a total of 73 women in 10 communities in rural and semi-urban areas of Swaziland. Of these 73 women, 64 had heard about the Medical Male Circumcision (MMC) project.

When asked if they were aware that there is need for consistent condom use after MMC, only 61 percent (39 out of the 64 women who knew about the project) said: Yes. This same percentage of respondents was aware that MMC does not provide 100-percent protection. Only 52 percent (33/64) knew that men need to abstain from sex for six weeks after MMC.

There’s a fear that men would increase their sexual risk-taking behaviors because they feel more or completely protected by MMC. This fear was expressed by 55 percent (22/40) of the women.

One of the women interviewed told the researchers, ‘Men would think they are 100 percent protected and they will continue to have sex without condoms with multiple partners putting me as wife at risk of getting HIV.

Only 47 percent (30/64) of the women said they talk about MMC with their partners. However, 86 percent (55/64) of the women were willing to be involved in the decision-making process to support their male partners during the healing process and to discuss circumcising their male children.

Fifty-two percent (33/64) of the women reported they are not comfortable asking their male partners to use male or female condoms, as men are the sexual decision-makers.

Only 33 percent (21/64) of the women said that they are currently and consistently using condoms.

WHiPT reported, ‘This number may be higher than other cohorts in Swaziland, given that the women surveyed were assumed to be predominantly HIV-positive.’

The women who are currently not using condoms said that their male partners would refuse to use condoms even when circumcised because they’ll falsely believe that they are 100-percent protected.

One woman told the researchers, ‘My partner does not want to use condoms even now. Nothing will make him to change his mind to use it. Men are difficult to convince.’

About 61 percent of the women said MMC would negatively impact gender-based violence, because men would refuse to use condoms after being circumcised. Condom negotiation would be even more difficult after MMC, given its current challenges, the women reported.

One woman told the researchers, ‘We were asked to use condoms and now circumcision. We are confused. Men are refusing to use condoms and we are not in the position to defend or negotiate for safe sex.’

WHiPT recommended, ‘Swaziland’s HIV/AIDS policy makers along with implementers and civil society advocates must address gender implications of MMC in the current policy by identifying, messaging and monitoring for potentially harmful outcomes of promoting MMC, such as increased behavior risks and sexual violence against women.’

The WHiPT report surveys women in five African nations, including Swaziland. To read the full report, click here

GOVERNMENT IGNORES COURT RULING

Both Swaziland’s Accountant General and the Attorney General are being hauled before the High Court on Friday (10 December 2010) because the Swazi Government has refused to pay legal costs in a major discrimination case it lost in the Supreme Court.

The Government owes Mary-Joyce Doo Aphane E33 962.15 (about US$50,000) – the sum it was ordered to pay when she successfully convinced the court that women could register property in their own name. Swazi traditional law says women are minors and have no rights.

But no money has been forthcoming. By not paying up now, the Swazi Government looks petty mean and spiteful.

But also, how typical. The Swazi Government has a long history of ignoring the rule of law.

Barnabas Dlamini, the present illegally-appointed Prime Minister, caused international outrage among key donors and international human rights groups when he was previously in office in November 2002.

At that time he said the government would not recognise two court judgements challenging the right of King Mswati III, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch, to rule by decree.

All six judges in the Swaziland Appeal Court resigned in protest. They returned to their posts two years later after a new Prime Minister, Themba Dlamini, was appointed by the King.

See also

SWAZI JUDGE DEFENDS CONSTITUTION

SWAZI JUDGE DEFENDS CONSTITUTION

A Swaziland High Court judge has rewritten a law because it is denies women their human rights.

Justice Qinisile Mabuza said she was entitled to do this because the Swazi Constitution allows judges to defend the rights of the Swazi people.

It happened on Tuesday (23 February 2010) when Justice Mabuza ruled that Swazi women may register property in their own name.

The ruling made national and international news, but as far as I can tell no media pointed out that Justice Mabuza had defended the constitution.

She wanted to find in favour of the applicant Doo Aphane but the law as it stood denied Aphane her human rights. So the judge changed the law.

It involved S16 (3) of the Deeds Registry Act, which reads:

‘immovable property, bonds and other real rights shall not be transferred or ceded to, or registered in the name of, a woman married in community of property, save where such property bonds or real rights are by law or by a condition of a bequest or donation excluded from the community’.

The judge said she would ignore this and instead rewrite the paragraph. She cut out the words ‘not’ and ‘save’ and replaced ‘save’ with the word ‘even’, thereby making the paragraph say the exact opposite to what the lawmakers intended.

The paragraph now reads:

‘immovable property, bonds and other real rights shall be transferred or ceded to, or registered in the name of, a woman married in community of property, even where such property bonds or real rights are by law or by a condition of a bequest or donation excluded from the community’.

To see the full judgement click here.

Justice Mabuza, the only woman High Court judge in Swaziland, says she is entitled to do this because ‘S151 (2) (a) of the constitution states that the High Court has jurisdiction to enforce fundamental human rights and freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution, This includes the right to equality which is guaranteed by sections 20 and 28 of the Constitution.’

She also criticised the Swazi Government for not moving faster to ‘embark on aggressive legal reforms especially those relating to women who have been marginalised over the years in many areas of the law.’

She awarded the costs of the trail against the government ‘in the hope that such sanction will galvanize them into action’.

This is a brave decision from Justice Mabuza. I’m sure we haven’t heard the last of it. How can Barnabas Dlamini, the illegally-appointed Prime Minister of Swaziland, who only this week said he was answerable to no one except King Mswati III, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absoluter monarch, let this go?

Just think what would happen if it caught on and all High Court judges started rewriting laws so they gave people their human rights.