SWAZILAND IS CRUMBLING STATE

Swaziland’s is a crumbling state that could become another Zimbabwe.

That was one of the warnings made in an article in the international press this week.

As hunger sweeps Swaziland – about 600,000 of the kingdom’s one million population relied on international food aid in the past year to fend off starvation – the HIV rate (nearly 40 percent) remains the highest in the world.

Added to this humanitarian disaster is a political crisis as King Mswati III has declared war against his own people in an attempt to crush a growing dissident movement.

Stuart Clark writing in The Sunday Business Post from the Republic of Ireland reported on Swaziland this week (30 November 2008). According to the newspaper one of the ‘most persistent thorns’ in the side of the king is the Swaziland Coalition of Concerned Civic Organisations (SCCCO).

Stephen Donaghy of SCCCO told the newspaper, ‘Swaziland makes a great pretence of being a democracy, but political parties are banned and the king appoints both the prime minister and the cabinet.’

‘He also has the power arbitrarily to dissolve parliament, nominate the people who select the country’s judges, and outlaw organisations that are allegedly supporting terrorism.,

On 15 November 2008, the illegally appointed Prime Minister of Swaziland Barnabas Dlamini branded four political formations as ‘terrorists’. This meant that members and supporters of the People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO), the Swaziland Youth Congress, Umbane and the Swazi Solidarity Network could face up to 25 years in jail.

The police raided the PUDEMO leader Mario Masuku’s house the following day and found nothing, but still took him into custody and charged him with terrorism.

‘The question we’re asking ourselves now is, “Who’s next”’, Donaghy told the newspaper.

Despite the intervention of the Centre for Conflict Resolution, the government has refused to enter talks with the Swaziland Federation of Trade Unions, which is one of SCCCO’s key members. ‘An option being considered at the moment is a general strike,’ Donaghy said. ‘There were already strikes on September 3 and 4, which brought 15,000 people out on to the streets of the capital, Mbabane, and the second city, Manzini.

‘The organisers made it clear that these were to be peaceful, but unfortunately a small number of hotheads on one of the marches clashed with the security forces.’

According to the Sunday Business Post, the trade unions’ commitment to peaceful protest isn’t shared by the unknown organisation that recently planted a bomb near one of the king’s 13 palaces, or those Swazis who are widely rumoured to be receiving paramilitary training in South Africa. The king’s reaction to all of this was to authorise the army’s purchase, during the summer, of 18,000 handguns, 20,000 grenades and a million bullets.



‘Does the potential exist for Swaziland to become the next Zimbabwe?’ asked a leading dissident who asked not to be named for fear of government reprisals. ‘Absolutely. At the moment, Swaziland is surviving on handouts from other countries; 600,000 people are receiving world food aid and you’ve got the government going on record as saying “We do not fear conflict, we know how to control it.” That’s scarily similar to the rhetoric employed by Robert Mugabe who, incidentally, happens to be a friend of the king’s.’



One of the people hoping to stave off violence through democratic change is newly elected Swazi MP Nonhlanhla Dlamini. ‘I had to wait six hours yesterday to meet the king, but when I did, I told him that the government previously had betrayed us, and I intend to pursue new legislation dealing with gender violence,’ she told the newspaper.



‘They always say things are in the pipeline - well, I’ve come in to clear the pipe. I also talked to him about issues of corruption, poverty and food supply and how things are likely to get worse. We’ve had several spells of drought recently causing harvests to fail, so that’s a major consideration.



‘I will also be questioning such budgetary decisions as nine of the king’s wives being given $1 million each to go on a shopping expedition to Dubai, when there are tens of thousands of Swazis who don’t have adequate food, accommodation or health care.” Dlamini is the outgoing director of the Swaziland Action Group Against Abuse (SWAGAA).

SWAZI COPS BREAK UP LEGAL RALLY

A pro-democracy protest was unconstitutionally broken up by Swaziland police on Saturday.

Members of the Swaziland Youth Congress (SWAYOCO) who tried to hold a rally were beaten up by police who said the demonstrators needed permission from the courts to hold a meeting.

The police action contravenes the Swaziland Constitution which guarantees freedom of association and freedom of speech.

SWAYOCO was protesting against the arrest on a terrorism charge of Mario Masuku, the president of the People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO).

According to a report in the Times of Swaziland today (2 December 2008) the protestors were at KaKhoza. SWAYOCO Secretary General Thabile Zwane said the campaign was supposed to start at 10am but to their member’s frustration by the police they ended up starting at noon.

‘It started well but it could not even last for an hour as where we had planned to assemble police were already in that area.

‘The police later asked if we had a right of being there and wanted permission and when we told them that KaKhoza residents had allowed us, they did not take that,’ she said.

She said elders of the area had allowed them to hold the campaign.

The Times reports that some of the police officers told them that they were going to get a court order banning them from holding the rally and while they were still waiting, OSSU caspirs started arriving and more officers filled the area.

Residents who had come to listen to SWAYOCO’s views on the manner the country is being governed were later forced to run.

"Everyone after seeing the police caspirs decided to run away because of previous experiences with the police," Zwane said.

The Swazi Observer today quoted SWAYOCO President Wandile Dludlu saying that the entire KaKhoza location was turned into a war zone as police officers did everything in their power to disperse them.

‘They assaulted us and we ran in all directions. I ran towards New Village and later got a ride from journalists who were travelling to Mbabane,’ Dludlu said.

Police spokesperson Inspector Stephen Dlamini denied that the police assaulted SWAYOCO members.

SWAZI TERROR SUSPECT DENIED VISITS

Pro-democracy advocates in Swaziland have gone to the Swazi High Court to demand the right to visit a political leader who has been charged with a terrorist offence.

Political formations and trade unions yesterday (1 December 2008) brought an application at the High Court for an order allowing friends and others to visit the incarcerated People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO) President Mario Masuku who is on remand at Matsapha Maximum Prison.

PUDEMO’s Secretary General Siphasha Dlamini, in her affidavit to the court, says since Masuku was arrested, visitation rights and access to him by friends, colleagues and associates had been extremely limited.

According to the Swazi Observer today (2 December 2008), Siphasha Dlamini says the British Deputy Commissioner Mark Norton was recently refused the right to see Masuku in Matsapha.

She also says the Swaziland Federation of Trade Unions general secretary Jan Sithole and a delegation from the Council of Swaziland Churches were also denied access to Masuku.

She told the Observer, ‘We have a reason to believe that many other caring citizens and leaders of civil society and non-government organisations, whether local, regional or international will continue to be refused opportunity to see Mario Masuku.’

Justice Mbutfo Mamba postponed the matter to Monday (8 December 2008) for hearing of arguments. Government will file opposing papers tomorrow.

SWAZI TERRORIST BAN ‘NOT LEGAL’

The Swazi Prime Minister’s branding of four political formations in Swaziland as terrorists is illegal, it has been revealed.

Barnabas Dlamini did not bother to follow the proper legal requirements before declaring that members and supporters of the four organisations were terrorists. Mario Masuku, president of the one of the groups – the People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO) - was immediately arrested (and is on remand in jail) following the prime minister’s announcement.

The Times Sunday reported yesterday (30 November 2008) that Dlamini’s pronouncement has no legal basis because there is no ‘legal instrument’ for the proscribing of PUDEMO, Swaziland Youth Congress (SWAYOCO), Swaziland Solidarity Network (SSN) and Swaziland Liberation Army (Umbane).

The ‘legal instrument’ would be a formal publishing or ‘gazetting’ of the decision.

Investigations made by the newspaper discovered that government printers had not yet received a sample of the gazette for printing purposes. The verbal pronouncement by the premier, the Times Sunday said, cannot outweigh the legal significance of the gazette.

Attorney General Majahenkhaba Dlamini said he was aware of the legal requirement to legitimise the pronouncement in the Gazette.

Legal sources within government said the prime minister’s pronouncement of 14 November 2008 had created uncertainties within the office of the attorney general as the Suppression of Terrorism Act, 2008, under which the parties were specified or alternatively banned, could be rendered meaningless if the banned entities were to appeal to the High Court.

Investigations by the Times Sunday revealed that the problem was worsened by the fact that the Suppression of the Terrorism Act allowed prescribed entities like the banned political parties to apply to the High Court for a review of the decision.

SWAZI COPS BAN DIPLOMATS’ MEETING

MEDIA RELEASE

SWAZILAND COALITION OF CONCERNED CIVIC ORGANIZATIONS

28 November 2008

Police Force Abandonment of Meeting Between Diplomats and the Swazi Civil Society



It is six years to the day that the Swazi Government’s infamous 28 November declaration that the state would not respect the decisions of the courts and so abrogated the rule of law. As if to remind the Swazi nation of the events of that day and its continuing disdain for legal norms, the Swazi Government through the Royal Swazi Police have forced a cancellation of a meeting between Diplomats accredited to Swaziland and the Civil Society. The meeting was convened by the Council of Swaziland Churches to take place at the Tums George Hotel at 2:30 PM.



The Police Station Commander in Manzini summoned the Secretariat of the Council of Swaziland Churches with His Lordship Bishop N. Ndlovu and the Coalition’s Musa Hlophe to the Manzini police station, where they were told that this meeting could not take place without the police’s presence, both inside and outside of the conference room, and taking notes of all the proceedings. He informed the organisers that only the government should speak to diplomats and it was none of civil society’s concern.



Confronted with this outrageous and bizarre demand by the police, Bishop Ndlovu and his delegation restated the citizen’s Constitutional right to privacy and freedom of assembly and expression. The police responded by referring to the Suppression of Terrorism Bill, which in their interpretation, trumped the Constitution. The delegation pointed out to the police that if their International and Constitutional rights could not be respected by the police, they would rather call off the meeting than expose their members and their invited guests from the diplomatic community to the risk of being labeled ‘supporters of terrorism’. Therefore the delegation reluctantly came to the conclusion that for the in the interests of avoiding a possible violent confrontation and placing the diplomatic community in this untenable position it was better to abandon the meeting.



Mr Hlophe went on by saying, ‘We challenge the police to tell us what crime was likely to be committed and by whom? These actions show that the real use of the Anti-Terrorism Act is not to protect the state from violence but to protect the blushes of this government from legitimate scrutiny and debate.’



He finished by saying, ‘Today on the sixth anniversary of the Rule of Law Crisis, the behaviour of the government and the police spoke more eloquently to the diplomats than we ever could have about the reality of human rights in this country.’



For More Information Please Contact Musa Hlophe +268 604 8988 +268 505 5911



sccco@swazi.net