WEEP NO TEARS FOR CHANNEL SWAZI

We should weep no tears at the news that Channel S television in Swaziland has been forced off the air after its property was attached to pay off bank debts.

Channel S (also known as Channel Swazi) may not be back on the air anytime soon, if at all.

If it never comes back it is no great loss. Channel S is (was) Swaziland’s only ‘independent’ television channel and was set up nearly 10 years ago in competition to Swaziland’s only other TV station, the state-controlled Swazi TV.

Channel S is a controversial television station run by an equally controversial man, Qhawe Mamba.



Swaziland is not a democracy and the government on behalf of the monarchy keeps a strong control of broadcast media. However, in 2001, in an effort to mislead the outside world that Swaziland supported freedom of expression, the government allowed Channel S, to begin operating within the kingdom.



King Mswati III supported Channel S, because he wanted to show that his regime was democratic and respected human rights, but this illusion was soon exposed when Channel S had its offices raided by police after it screened a report deemed too critical of the king. The authorities immediately reined in any hint of independence at Channel S.



The criticism of the king was an aberration, because Mamba has always been excessively loyal to the monarchy. For many years he managed to hold down two jobs. Even while he was head of Channel S he was employed full time by the Swaziland government-controlled station, Swazi TV.



During this time Mamba was a ‘praise singer’ for Swazi King Mswati, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch. A ‘praise singer’ is exactly what it sounds like and Mamba would travel across the world following the king on his travels and reporting back for Swazi TV on the king’s deeds and singing the praises of the king to anyone who would listen.

In February 2008, Mamba went on record to say that Channel S television would always support King Mswati. Mamba was reported saying ‘this is something they would do always because they paid allegiance to their king in their capacity as bona fide citizens’.



He went on, ‘We are citizens of the Kingdom and we have to be patriotic.’

With the death of Channel S (if indeed death it is) we lose one more outlet for the king’s propaganda. Good riddance.

FALSE DAWN FOR BROADCAST FREEDOM

News that the state-run radio and television in Swaziland are to change and become ‘public service broadcasters’ is not true.

A statement from the Media Institute for Southern Africa (MISA) – Swaziland chapter said that the Swaziland Public Broadcasting Bill, expected to be tabled before the Swazi Parliament within the next six months, will see the present broadcasting stations ‘transformed’.

It is true that there is a bill, but it will not lead to ‘public service broadcasting’.

In the debate taking place around the new bill there is a basic misunderstanding about what ‘public service broadcasting’ is.

In Swaziland at present we have a’ public broadcasting service’, that is a service that is broadcast to the public. The ‘service’ is state controlled and the new bill does not intend to change that. Radio and television will come under a new commission that will be appointed by the Minister of Information. Radio and television will continue to be an arm of the ruling elite, while Swaziland remains an absolute monarchy.

‘Public service broadcasting’ is a very particular kind of broadcasting and most definitely not broadcast from Swaziland. Public service broadcasting aims to inform, educate and entertain in a way in which the commercial or state sector left unregulated would not do. Generally, it is understood that public service broadcasters air a wide range of programmes in a variety of tastes and interests. They speak to everyone as a citizen and everyone has an opportunity to access the airways and participate in public life.

Public service broadcasting in providing access to a wide range of information and ideas empowers people through its programming. This empowerment goes against the grain in Swaziland, which is not a democracy. Currently, broadcasters in Swaziland serve the interests of the ruling elites and not those of the people. Broadcasting is state-controlled, that means no criticism of the staus quo is allowed on the airwaves in Swaziland. Any criticism of the ruling elite is seen as ‘non-Swazi’.

In the past the minister responsible for broadcasting has taken a ‘hands-on’ role, believing he has the right to make day-to-day decisions that affect the broadcasting organisations. This was made explicit in 2003 by the then Minister of Information Abednego Ntshangase who announced a censorship policy for state media, saying that, ‘the national television and radio stations are not going to cover anything that has a negative bearing on government’.

Today that policy of censorship continues.

Public service broadcasting cannot exist alongside state control. Public service broadcasting must keep a distance from vested interests (in the case of Swaziland that’s the ruling elite). Radio and television stations need to be left alone to make their own decisions regarding business and the content of their channels. The new Public Broadcasting Bill does not do that.

Sorry, but it’s business as usual with the new Public Broadcasting Bill – don’t be fooled.

TRUTH ABOUT SWAZILAND ON US TV

There is no doubt in my mind that people in the free world are getting the message about how undemocratic a kingdom Swaziland is.

The latest example comes from ABC television in the United States, which has been running a series about royal families around the world and this week featured King Mswati III of Swaziland.

ABC aired a short film on the king and also published a lengthy feature article on its website. The reporter left the audience in no doubt about the reality of life in Swaziland between the royal family and ordinary folk.

The film shows the king at the 40/40 celebrations in 2008 which marked the king’s 40^th birthday and also at the Reed Dance, at which tens of thousands of bare breasted maidens dance for the king.

‘Flashy cars, fancy palaces and demanded adoration [from the people] are trademarks’ of King Mswati’s rule, it says.

But, the report goes on, ‘Outside the royal parties is a country teetering on collapse,’ with the highest HIV infection rate in the world and where ‘poverty and hunger are rampant’.

King Mswati, the report says, ‘tolerates absolutely no dissent’.

It sums up Swaziland very well I think, with this phrase. ‘Critics say what he [the king] calls tradition, the rest of the world calls dictatorship’.

To see the filmed report, which lasts a little over a minute click below. To see the film and the written feature article click here.

SWAZI PRINCESS TELEVISION SHAME

I wrote in May 2008 that Swaziland King Mswati III’s eldest daughter Princess Sikhanyiso has been named one of the world’s most talked about royals by Forbes.

Now some kind soul has shared with us a short film that Forbes made about the girl who claims she is ‘an ambassador for Africa’.

In an interview published on the Internet site YouTube, she says she is a rebel because she pursues what she wants against all the odds.

She says she is completely honest about who she is. She is one of the king’s 22 children.

Close followers of the princess will be delighted to know that she entertains the television viewers with one of her raps. She also talks in some detail about her love of clothes and her 3,600 dollar boots. [Reality check: in Swaziland 70 per cent of the population live in abject poverty earning less than one dollar a day.]

Princess Sikhanyiso concludes, ‘The best thing about being royal is getting anything you want.’

The princess may come to regret her television appearance if the comments left by viewers to YouTube are anything to go by. As one contributor puts it, ‘one day she will look back on this with great shame and regret ... however, unlike the rest of us - her period of stupidity and ignorance is being documented and broadcast to the entire world’.

To see the clip click below or go to this link.