(From Swazi Media Commentary 20 July 2009 www.swazimedia.blogspot.com)
While the
Swaziland media are busy telling us what a success King Mswati III is having
on his state visit to Zambia voices of dissent are being raised in the country
itself.
The Zambia Post newspaper has attacked its own president Rupiah Banda for
inviting the king, the last absolute monarch in sub-Saharan Africa, and for
paying
public tribute to the king by congratulating him on his ‘wise
leadership’ and saying that he ensures ‘that the Swazi people benefit
from economic development and actively participate in the election of
their representatives in the government’.
The Post
isn’t taken in at all. In a long and hard hitting editorial the
newspaper says, ‘Mswati is running a tyrannical royal dictatorship in
Swaziland’ and calls on the Southern African Development Community ‘to put
serious pressure on Mswati for the democratisation of Swaziland’.
Swaziland,
it reminds us, is a kingdom where political parties are banned and
freedom of association is suppressed. The newspaper called the 2008
elections in Swaziland a ‘daylight fraud’.
The Post
says, ‘Whilst the Swazi King was entertained to a state banquet here
and enjoyed game viewing in one of our national parks in the company of
Rupiah, he has subjected the people of Swaziland to hunger and poverty
whilst he and his family enjoy a lavish lifestyle.’
The newspaper goes on to say that while the king and his family enjoy
fabulous wealth the majority of Swazi people are poor and do not have access
to basic services.
‘Swaziland
is a neo-colonial and semi-feudal enclave ruled by an absolute monarchy
together with his family. It is a country that is naturally endowed
with abundant resources, but is suffering from the crisis of a royal
kwashiorkor, called the Tinkhundla system. This system by definition is
about the entrenchment of royal hegemony in all spheres of Swazi
society, thus turning the people into objects of royal pity and
plunder. This is the essence of royal rule, through imposed hegemony,
where the King is everything. He is the chancellor of the university,
he is the commander-in-chief of the army, he is the patron of thousands
of NGOs that front for his hegemony in the name of serving the poor, he
is a head of state and more than anything else, a very key businessman,
with huge economic interests in every sector of Swazi society.
‘His
hands are full of activity that reinforces his greed and entrenches his
monopoly over every sphere of Swazi society, not least the economy.
This basic truth is important to always remember and recite in order to
capture the real essence and structure of Swaziland, and why it is
performing. It is obviously suffering from the heavy weight of royal
plunder, lack of innovation and creativity, and more than anything
else, greed and cancerous corruption, which had permeated every sector
of Swazi society and has destroyed its moral fibre.’
And that’s only half of it. To read the full editorial click here..
Link http://swazimedia.blogspot.com/2009/07/truth-about-swaziland-king.html
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "SA
Swaziland Solidarity EOM Forum" group. Visit the group site at
http://groups-beta.google.com/group/sa-swaziland-solidarity-eom-forum for more
options, pages and files.
To post to the group, send email to
[email protected] or reply to this message.
To unsubscribe, send email to
[email protected]
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
