Swaziland Newsletter 42
Published by Southern Africa Contact (Denmark)

Earlier issues can be read at
http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/SAK-Swazinewsletter together with documents
and other materials not included in the regular newsletter.

If you wish to subscribe to the newsletter, please send a mail to:
SAK-Swazinewsletter-subscribe@....

See photo section on the land, life and struggle of the Swazi people. Please
forward to friends and colleagues.
--------------------------------------

1. Government angered by accusations that constitution is undemocratic. Reuters
Alert, 25 October 2006.

2. Central Bank of Swaziland annual review: unimpressive economic growth and
deterioration of the standard of living. IRIN, October 20, 2006.

3. Pro-democracy group, The National Constitutional Assembly (NCA), threatens
protest action. IRIN, October 11, 2006.

4. Forgotten HIV children in Swaziland: poverty will decide whether they live or
die. BBC NEWS: October 25, 2006.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/6081460.stm

5. Parliamentary Committee accuses newspaper of defamation, demands apology.
Newspaper will not apologise. Media Institute of Southern Africa (Windhoek),
October 12, 2006.

6. Stephen Faulkner: Two Swaziland poems. BURDEN OF POWER and THE REED DANCE.

7. From the region: Lean season as rich countries fail to deliver food aid.
Swaziland facing huge reductions. Reuters, October 26, 2006.

-----------------------------------------
1. Government angered by accusations that constitution is undemocratic. Reuters
Alert, 25 October 2006.

Demands for democratic reform in Swaziland are meeting with an angry response
from government, which denies that the recently promulgated constitution is
illegitimate.

"It is ludicrous that it is suggested that our constitution is illegitimate.
[The constitution] is clearly the will of the people, after a full, transparent
process which was endorsed by the lawmakers of the country and, I may add, the
international community," Prime Minister Themba Dlamini said in his first
official statement countering calls for democratic reform by the National
Constitutional Assembly (NCA), an umbrella organisation representing labour
unions, human rights groups and banned political parties.

The NCA said the new constitution, compiled under the supervision of King Mswati
III's brothers, Prince Mangaliso and Prince David, and palace-appointed
commissions during a costly decade-long constitutional exercise, merely
enshrined the political status quo of sub-Saharan Africa's last absolute
monarch.

"The Constitution, which is the will of the people, will strive to serve the
best interest of all its citizens, and not specific interest groups which have
their own agendas and ambitions," Dlamini said in his statement in response to
the NCA's claims earlier this month that the new constitution was
"illegitimate".

"From the beginning to end, the process of making the Swaziland Constitution,
and its purported adoption, was a government project, as opposed to being an
all inclusive people-driven process," the NCA said. "This is due to lack of
genuine and effective citizen participation during the process of its making,
and the environment, which continues to be hostile to people and organisations
with dissenting views. Yet it is generally accepted that in order for a
constitution to be legitimate, credible and to enjoy popular support, it must
be a product of consensus of all major stakeholders, and must not be controlled
by those in government."

NCA member Thulani Maseko said the alliance is planning to march this week on
Lozitha Palace, 20km southeast of the capital, Mbabane, to protest against the
constitution being drawn up without widespread consultation.

Dissent in the kingdom, where two-thirds of the one million people live on US$2
or less a day, has been swiftly put down by the country's security forces.
Local newspapers last month documented incidents of alleged police brutality
during a march to the prime minister's office in Mbabane, by University of
Swaziland students demanding that government honour its scholarship
commitments.

"If it is remotely true that any of the citizens of Swaziland have been
'brutally attacked and charged at' by any law enforcement agency in
Swaziland, formal charges should be laid by the alleged victims and the law
will follow its course," Dlamini's statement read.

The prime minister said government would not comment on "unfounded allegations
and innuendos", after NCA charges that bad governance has led to Swaziland's
economic doldrums - the growth rate is expected to decline to 1.8 percent from
last year's 2.1 percent, according to a central bank report to government
earlier this month.

"If truth be told, the single greatest factor which would contribute to any form
of economic decline in a country is an unstable and politicised workforce,
which, to its own detriment, carries out industrial action not for economic
purposes but to appease the political ambitions of their leaders and other
external forces," the prime minister said.

Swaziland had a brief flirtation with a Westminster-style parliamentary
democracy, in which political parties contended for power, for five years after
it was granted independence from Britain in 1968. In 1973 the reigning monarch,
King Sobhuza II, overturned the constitution agreed with the former colonial
power, instituted a state of emergency - still in force - banned opposition
political parties and meetings, and assumed ultimate executive, judicial and
legislative authority for the monarchy.

"I have no doubt that this government, when benchmarked with all other African
nations, will be found to be governing in the upper quartile, and that the
wellbeing of its people will also compare favourably," Dlamini said.
--------------------
2. Central Bank of Swaziland annual review: unimpressive economic growth and
deterioration of the standard of living. IRIN, October 20, 2006.

Swaziland's decade-long economic malaise took a sharp downward turn with the
central bank's disclosure this week that growth had slowed to its lowest level
in 40 years.

The Central Bank of Swaziland's governor, Martin Dlamini, said in a candid
admission, "This year's unimpressive economic growth implies a deterioration of
the standard of living as measured by per capita income," in the bank's annual
report to the government, covering the period March 2005 to February 2006.

Swaziland, ruled by sub-Sahara's last absolute monarch, saw growth slow to 1.8
percent from the previous year's 2.1 percent, while the population increased by
2.9 percent. The bank estimated that annual economic growth of 3.5 percent was
required to have any real impact on the low living standards of its roughly 1
million people, of which about two-thirds live on US$2 or less a day, according
to the United Nations Development Programme. UNAIDS has put HIV/AIDS prevalence
at 33 percent among sexually active adults, the highest in the world.

"The downward trend in economic performance is a reflection of the low growth
rate in foreign direct investment, weaker performance of the manufacturing
sector and low agricultural productivity," said the report.

Declining agricultural productivity, felt most acutely on communal Swazi Nation
Land, where 80 percent of the population lives in chronic poverty on small
farms under palace-appointed chiefs, was compounded by drought. The bank warned
of serious food shortages, particularly maize, the staple food.

Government policies encouraging subsistence farmers to pursue commercially
orientated farming practices to alleviate poverty have met with limited success
in diversifying crops, but not in production results. The cultivation of more
drought-resistant crops saw an increase in land devoted to cotton production
from 2,795ha last year to 2,861ha this year, but cotton production fell by 1.3
percent.

Sugar, Swaziland's main export, performed slightly better, though this was at
the expense of citrus, another principal agricultural export, after several
citrus estates switched to sugar cultivation. Growth in the mining sector was
impeded by government reluctance to issue new leases, which saw earnings drop
by 36 percent, the bank said.

The closure of major companies and lower foreign direct investment in the
manufacturing sector, most notably in the labour-intensive textile industry,
contributed to a slowdown in manufacturing growth. The days when Asian-owned
garment and textile businesses thrived in Swaziland under the US-sponsored
African Growth and Opportunities Act trade scheme, creating tens of thousands
of jobs, have become a distant memory.

Describing foreign direct investment as a crucial ingredient of economic growth,
the central bank reported an annual decline in investment from an average of 4.7
percent between 1994 and 2002 to 2.5 percent in 2006.

"Although there have been no large disinvestments from Swaziland, some clothing
and textile firms have closed down during the first six months of 2006, and job
losses in the textile sector are estimated to be high. The sugar industry is
also expected to shed a significant number of jobs during the course of 2006."

Efforts by government to encourage Swazis to replace lost formal-sector jobs
with entrepreneurial activities are seen as a non-starter. "The unavailability
of finance for this sector remains a prohibiting factor to a majority of
indigenous Swazis to engage in self-employment activities," the report pointed
out.

Swaziland's AIDS crisis continues to have a severe economic impact, with
HIV-positive women attending ante-natal clinics increasing from 39 percent in
2002 to 43 percent in the period under review, while the growing number of
HIV/AIDS orphans was putting a high burden on the elderly.

"The HIV/AIDS pandemic has continued to pose a major threat to economic growth,
and has had a severe impact on poverty levels, which have been escalating over
the years," the bank commented.
-------------------
3. Pro-democracy group, The National Constitutional Assembly (NCA), threatens
protest action. October 11, 2006 (IRIN).

A pro-democracy group, The National Constitutional Assembly (NCA), an ad-hoc
alliance of trade unions, human rights and legal support and advocacy groups,
is threatening protest action against sub-Saharan Africa's last absolute
monarch if steps are not taken to start meaningful constitutional reform.

The NCA's direct demand to Mswati comes after the organisation recently
delivered a petition to the parliamentary offices of Prime Minister Themba
Dlamini and the Lozitha Palace offices of the Swaziland National Council
Standing Committee, the king's handpicked counsellors, saying that "the supreme
law of the land is illegitimate".

Previous attempts by pro-democracy reformers and other organisations, such as
student and labour unions, to air their grievances have been broken up by riot
police.

The NCA is currently embroiled in a High Court action challenging the legitimacy
of the new constitution, which came into effect this year after a process
lasting nearly a decade, giving the king ultimate executive, judicial and
legislative control of government, an outcome that merely entrenched the
prevailing political status quo.

The alliance petition included demands to investigate deaths in police custody
and to respect the rule of law. A 2005 report by international rights group
Amnesty International cited numerous instances of torture and abuse by the
police and the military, resulting in the death of several suspects.

Political analysts, who declined to be identified, said the petition was
designed to put the government on the defensive about its track record of
ignoring court decisions it disliked.

"Government will probably not respond to the NCA's list of demands by Monday (16
October), and probably not ever. Any attempt by NCA to see the king will be
broken up by police. The NCA strategy appears to be one of casting a spotlight
on rule of law and human rights in the country, lest the international
community become complacent about the situation in Swaziland," said one
analyst.

The petition also called on government to comply with a court decision in
November 2002, instructing the police to permit the return of political exiles,
which had led to the resignation of the entire Court of Appeals bench after the
government ignored the court's ruling.

The court had ruled that it was illegal to block the return of 200 residents of
kaMkhweli and Macetjeni, who were evicted after refusing to transfer their
allegiance from their traditional chiefs to Prince Maguga, a brother of the
king, who had claimed authority over the two areas. Police prevented Macetjeni
evictee Madeli Fakudze, brother to one of the deposed chiefs, and others, from
returning home. It was only after Fakudze appealed to the king that he was
allowed to return. The appeal court has since been reconstituted. Other
evictees either remained internally displaced or in exile as refugees.

The government said it had resolved the issues of evictees and exiles, a claim
disputed by the NCA. "We demand that government stops making political
statements and meaningless promises at the expense of the weakest of the
citizens, and abide by the orders of its courts," the petition said.

Most of the NCA's grievances deal with the new constitution, compiled under the
supervision of Mswati's brothers, Prince Mangaliso and Prince David, and
palace-appointed commissions. "From the beginning to end, the process of making
the Swaziland Constitution and its purported adoption was a government project,
as opposed to being an all-inclusive, people-driven process," said the NCA.

Opposition parties have been banned since 1973, when a state of emergency came
into force, a situation that the prime minister has said remains unchanged,
although Mswati has hinted that the country required further economic
development before political parties could function legally.

Swaziland's economy has been in steep decline for the past three years. Tens of
thousands of jobs in the garment industry have disappeared and an annual growth
rate of 3.6 percent has dropped to 1 percent. Once a net exporter of food to the
region, two-thirds of its one million people now live below the poverty line,
according to the United Nations Development Programme.

The NCA said that as long as the royal government writes the laws of the land,
ordinary Swazis would be disenfranchised.

"This is due to lack of genuine and effective citizen participation during the
process of its making [the constitution] and the environment which continues to
be hostile to people and organisations with dissenting views. Yet, it is
generally accepted that in order for a constitution to be legitimate, credible,
and to enjoy popular support, it must be a product of consensus of all major
stakeholders, and must not be controlled by those in government."

Read the full text of the NCA petition "For the country to avoid violent
confrontation..." at http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/SAK-Swazinewsletter
-----------
5. Forgotten HIV children: poverty will decide whether they live or die. BBC
NEWS: October 25, 2006.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/6081460.stm

Children with HIV and Aids in the developing world are half as likely as adults
to get life-saving drugs. This means fewer than one in 10 of over two million
children infected get anti-retroviral treatment (ARVs).

The BBC's Angus Crawford met three children living with the illness in
Swaziland, which has the highest rate of infection in the world.
Nkhosibona is very shy. He sits in his mother's arms, wriggling and putting his
head on her shoulder.

His father died of Aids three years ago and his mother Phindile is HIV-positive.
But what she can't do, like thousands of others, is find out if her boy is
infected too.

"I don't have money, the hospitals are too far, I have to go by bus," she says.
"There are many families here facing the same problem."
I ask her what happens to those children.
"We wait until they get ill and die," she says.

The first barrier to treatment is diagnosis. Just like Nkhosibona, more than 90%
of those with HIV in the developing world don't know they have the disease.
Half of all children born with the illness will die before their fifth birthday.

"Children have been the missing face in the fight against HIV and Aids because
they don't speak for themselves and they cannot be tested until they are over
18 months," says Pelucy Ntambirweki of the UN children's charity, Unicef, based
in Swaziland.

Poverty barrier

Thembelani is wearing a bright yellow shirt covered in red pineapples and the
word Hawaii.

When he sees us he runs to a small mud brick house surrounded by weeds.
His father Jeremiah comes out to greet us. He and his wife are both on ARVs but
he doubts whether his son, who's also HIV-positive, will get the treatment.
"They want you to be very, very sick - be bed-ridden first," he said.

The journey to the clinic takes five hours by bus but they don't have enough
money for the fare.

A second barrier to treatment is poverty, poor infrastructure and a lack of
medical staff.

Pelucy says the chances of a child like Thembelani getting treatment "depend on
who is taking care of him, how far he is from the clinic, and if there is
access to the right medication".

Thanks to charities, governments and drugs firms those medicines are usually
free to the poorest. But they are not always user-friendly.

Child-friendly drugs

Xolani is tiny. He is 12, but is the height of a five-year-old.
He proudly shows me his ARVs. "He has improved very, very much - tremendously
health wise," says his father Mangaliso.

That is because Xolani is taking adult drugs which are broken in half.
Before he took bottles of syrups designed for children, but his father found it
hard to get the dose right.

He gave his son three bottles, twice a day in a hut with no light. The markings
on their one syringe rubbed off. Xolani became more and more ill.

What doctors in Swaziland want are easy to use, fixed-dose combination drugs -
they exist for adults but not yet here for children.

"Having a product that is one size fits all - no one is saying that's feasible,"
says Jon Pender, director of government affairs for GlaxoSmithKline, the largest
pharmaceutical company in Europe.

They provide their ARVs at cost price to Africa and deny they are neglecting
investment in child-friendly drugs.

"The tools are there to treat children but most mothers in Africa don't have
access to any kind of health care systems at all," he says.
For Xolani, Thembelani and Nkhosibona, it is ultimately poverty which will
decide whether they live or die.


-----------
6. Parliamentary Committee accuses newspaper of defamation, demands apology.
Newspaper will not apologise. Media Institute of Southern Africa (Windhoek),
October 12, 2006.

On 5 October 2006, the "Times of Swaziland" newspaper was accused of having
defamed Parliament and ordered to apologise.

A parliamentary committee charged with investigating the newspaper over an
article published on 8 March found that the article in question "damaged the
dignity and reputation of Parliament".

The report states that "the 'Times of Swaziland' must unconditionally apologise
to the Parliament of the Kingdom of Swaziland with immediate effect."
The article under investigation criticised MPs for their alleged interference in
the management of the state radio station, the Swaziland Broadcasting and
Information Services (SBIS).

The managing editor of the "Times of Swaziland" has defended his decision to
publish the article and has said the newspaper will not apologise. Parliament
has not yet taken a decision on what will happen to the newspaper in the event
it does not apologise.

MISA-Swaziland has spoken out strongly against the position of Parliament on
this matter, which MISA perceives to be a blatant attack on freedom of
expression. MISA also condemns the parliamentary report which, MISA says,
critically undermines the newspaper's editorial independence.

In addition, MISA-Swaziland reminded the government that its role is not to act
as media watchdog, but to uphold the democratic values of freedom of
expression, the right to information and press freedom.

---------
7. Stephen Faulkner: Two Swaziland poems. BURDEN OF POWER and THE REED DANCE.


BURDEN OF POWER

Turned on the television
To catch the late news
Any news

There he was
In his green little Kingdom

Every news item about him

Opening up a new prison
Walking through a tea party
High-tabling a donor's conference
Speechifying
About the importance
Of tradition
Honesty and good behaviour
In a time of rampaging viruses
About the importance
Of Loyalty
To Oneself
To one's loved ones
And being special subjects
In a world gone mad
Beyond the high borders
Of this his Kingdom

In all of these tiresome cameos
Of criminal hypocrisy
He seems so disarmingly harmless
If ridiculous
His Supreme Commander's uniform
Festooned with medals
And ribbons and honours
Of battles and campaigns
Not fought

So weighed down is he
With historic responsibility
Armed lackeys
Follow his every move
In case he should stumble

'Good Evening
Here is this news
Yesterday the King staggered
Under the burden of office
And almost fell'.


THE REED DANCE

I had a dream
Twenty thousand
Bare breasted virgins
In one delicious revolting act
Threw their reeds into the air
And like javelins
They landed on one point

And a punctured monarch
Scampered into the bush
Like a frightened porcupine.
-------------------------------------

8. From the region: Lean season as rich countries fail to deliver food aid.
Swaziland facing huge reductions. Reuters, October 26, 2006.

Millions of people in southern Africa face food shortages after rich countries
failed to meet money pledges, the U.N. food agency said on Thursday.

The World Food Programme (WFP) said a $60 million gap in funds has forced it to
cut aid to up to 4.3 million people in southern Africa.
That included aid to mother and child nutrition centers, school feeding projects
and schemes targeting HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis patients, for whom nutrition is
key in boosting immunity to diseases that have ravaged the region.

Namibia, Malawi and Swaziland faced aid reductions of between 80 and 100
percent. HIV/AIDS rates in Swaziland are among the highest in the world.

The shortages coincide with the coming so-called lean season, when southern
Africa has to wait until March or April for new harvests.
"Due to a lack of donor support, since September WFP offices across the region
have begun to reduce the level of food assistance provided to mother and child
nutrition centers, school-feeding projects and patients receiving medication
for HIV/AIDS or tuberculosis," it said in a statement.

"Here, where HIV prevalence rates are the highest in the world, people are dying
of AIDS-related illness when they could have survived for years if they had had
enough food to eat. Anti-retroviral therapy is not effective on an empty
stomach."

The statement said the WFP had so far received only half the $118 million in
cash contributions needed.

Around 1.4 million people were in critical need of food aid in Zimbabwe, where
the WFP said it had been forced in October to scale back help to about half the
900,000 people then in need.

Critics blame persistent food deficits in Zimbabwe on drought and an exodus of
the country's most productive commercial white farmers who fled the
government's controversial land reform programme.

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Swaziland Newsletter is published by Southern Africa Contact
(Denmark) and distributed to more than 1200 national and
international organisations, research institutes, universities, trade
unions and labour movements, political parties, church organisations,
print and electronic media, governments, diplomatic missions, members of
parliament, parliamentary committees and private individuals in Southern
Africa, Europe and the United States of America.

Comments and suggestions, including digital photographic material, to be sent to
pmm@...

Support the democratic movement in Swaziland. Donations can be made through the
MANDELA FUND: BG Bank, Norre Voldgade 68, 1358 Copenhagen K, Denmark.
SWIFT-BIC: DABADKKK. Registration Number: 0274. Account Number: 3327000. The
MANDELA FUND is a registered national collection in Denmark.