A TALE OF TWO SWAZILAND LIFESTYLES

Here’s another ‘snapshot’ of Swaziland.

King Mswati III’s wives have moved into state houses while their palaces are being renovated.

Meanwhile, the King’s own newspaper reports that a Swazi family are so destitute they have to live in a disused maize storage tank.

The Times Sunday reported this week (18 January 2009) that the wives had moved to state houses which took three years to build at a cost of many millions of emalangeni.

‘The new state houses have spacious rooms, with imported tiles and state of the art interior finishing. Each comes with a guardhouse, for security jointly provided by the army and police,’ the newspaper reports.

‘Other palaces that are under renovations are Engabezweni Royal Residence, which is under major expansion, and is the official residence of Inkhosikati LaNgangaza. Nkoyoyo palace, which is home to Inkhosikati LaMbikiza, is also being renovated.’

At the last count the King had 13 wives (we can’t be sure because the number of wives the King has is information the Swazi people aren’t allowed to know).

The King has a wealth of 200 million US dollars (E1.4 billion), but I’d be very surprised indeed if he used any of this money on the mansions. The ordinary Swazi people will have to pick up the bill.

Meanwhile, back at the maize storage tank.

The King’s own newspaper, the Swazi Observer, reported last week that a family of four, headed by a man with epilepsy, are forced to live in the tank since his house burnt down.

The newspaper reports, ‘The tank has an opening at the base which they use as a door while the opening of the tank is used as a window. The family sleeps u-shaped with the father by the “door” to protect the family and the mother by the window.’

No state-of-the-art interior finishings here.

The Observer has also been visiting the community of Lavumisa. Here they found a child who is so malnourished that his growth has been stunted. (As I reported previously, four out of 10 Swazi children have stunted growth through malnutrition).

Although the child is four years old, he looks like a one year old. He has a twin sister who has the same problem and now lives with grandparents in South Africa.

Their unemployed father, estimated to be aged 55, said they went for days without food.

They live in a dilapidated shack made of iron sheets.

(I’ll leave you to write in your own expressions of outrage.)

See also

POVERTY

SWAZI URBAN FOLK GO HUNGRY

It seems that Swazi Prince Masitela (often described by the Swazi media as a ‘senior’ prince) has only just discovered that people in Swaziland are going hungry.

The prince, who is the regional administrator of Manzini, Swaziland’s business capital, now wants the National Disaster and Management Agency to distribute food rations to the hungry.

Masitela said people in urban areas do not have land to plough, unlike people in the rural areas.

I don’t want to be unnecessarily hurtful to the prince but it is obvious to anyone who every visits an urban area that there are poor and hungry people. How is it that he has only just noticed? I wrote earlier this month about the children who had to give up school to collect tin cans to sell in order (mostly unsuccessfully) to put food on the table.

Any visitor to a shopping complex car park in Swaziland will be aware of the large numbers of often quite small children who ‘sell’ misshapen spoons. Anyone who buys these spoons isn’t making a purchase because they want spoons, it is generally recognised that the spoons are a ‘front’ for begging. Without the generosity of the buyers, these children and their families would starve.

It is well known that over the past year about 650,000 of Swaziland’s one million population have received food aid from international donors.

In the Swazi Observer yesterday (29 October 2008) Masitsela is quoted saying that if the people in urban areas are hungry, they start engaging in crime.

This is almost certainly true, but the bigger crime here is the way in which ordinary people are treated in Swaziland. As I wrote last Friday (24 October 2008) http://swazimedia.blogspot.com/2008/10/all-swazis-are-millionaires.html Swaziland isn’t a particularly ‘poor’ country by world standards. The problem is the wealth that is created goes to only a small group of people. And most of it goes to Prince Masitsela and the rest of the Royal Family.

Perhaps one way of solving the hunger problem is to force the prince and his family to give the Swazi people their fair shares.

See also

ALL SWAZIS ARE MILLIONAIRES

STARVING SWAZI KIDS SCRAP FOR FOOD