To: Dr. Irvan Khoza- Chairman -Orlando Pirates Football Club
Mr.
Kaizer Motaung – Executive Director- Kaizer Chiefs Football Club
RE:
SOWETO GIANTS SHOULD NOT SPOIL THEIR RICH HISTORY BY HONOURING A TINPOT DESPOT.
When the current manager of
the English national team, Roy Hodgson, was appointed into his post his past
was brought up to remind the public of the social role that sports
personalities cannot escape. At the height of Apartheid, Hodgson had naively
and insensitively allowed himself to be used by the Apartheid regime in its
public relations tactics to reverse its pariah state status by participating in
a football match.
Today human rights violations
continue and despotic regimes still desperately seek unsuspecting sports and
music personalities to use as pawns. Where this unfortunate situation exists,
the conscientious world has responded by boycotting and isolating these ignoble
regimes.
King Mswati is one such
dictator and he has found perfect pawns in two of Southern Africa’s biggest
sports clubs, Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates. These two African giants need
to understand the blot they might have on their impeccable record of history,
if they allow themselves to sell their souls and be ‘bought for thirty pieces
of silver’ by participating in the forthcoming public relations hoodwink -
dubbed Super King’s Cup, in Swaziland.
DESPOT
It has long been widely known
in South Africa and beyond that Swaziland’s government has no respect for human
rights and that the country has no political freedom. Swaziland is a
dictatorship. It continues to evade the international media radar mainly
because the country is so miniscule, with even less prestige internationally.
The country has no democracy
at all. All power is vested in the monarchy, which rules by decree despite the
existence of a worthless constitution which was imposed on the citizens ten
years ago. As an absolute monarch the king only delegates his judicial,
executive and legislative powers to powerless institutions which may make one
believe that the country is run like modern state when it is in fact run like
the king’s personal farm.
While there is no law that
explicitly bans the formation and functioning of political parties, they are
effectively rendered useless by the fact that they cannot contest state power
as that power is vested exclusively in the king who appoints the prime
minister, deputy prime minister, all cabinet ministers, a third of parliament,
all senior civil servants and members of the diplomatic corps. As another
king’s appointee, the country’s senate president recently pointed out, the king
is the state.
KLEPTOCRACY
With all this power vested in
him, the king of Swaziland has not held back on abusing it to fulfil his
selfish personal greed. This has resulted in him forcing all major investments
in the country to guarantee him and his family’s trust fund, Tibiyo, shares in
their businesses. As a result of this he owns virtually half the country’s
economy. Despite his hold on so much personal wealth the king still draws royal
emoluments from the state which is over a fifth of the nation’s budget.
It is these kleptocratic
tendencies which have resulted in the country’s economy growing sluggishly
while the rest of the region’s economies make major strides. It is worth
pointing out for example that the country remains the only one in the region
with a sole mobile phone operator, MTN Swaziland, a company that retains its
monopoly primarily because the king has substantial shares in it. All attempts by
other companies to break into the market have been futile. This is perhaps the
reason why some mobile phone operators may wish to sponsor an event like the
Super King’s Cup in order to gain favour with the country’s despot.
HUMAN
RIGHTS ABUSES
Human rights abuses in
Swaziland are endemic because the people have no government of their own. At
every level of society people are denied basic human rights. Political
dissenters are detained arbitrarily or with spurious charges levelled against
them.
Like the Apartheid regime,
king Mswati’s regime has gone to great lengths to tarnish the image of those
who call for democracy in the country and there are legal instruments that are
used to achieve this end such as the infamous Suppression of Terrorism Act,
which gave the country’s government legal authority to declare any entity as a
terrorist organisation. Once declared terrorist organisations such formations
are proscribed and any association with them results in severe sanction
including harsh prison sentences.
It was due to this act that
one political activist by the name of Sipho Jele was arrested in May 1, 2010
for merely wearing a T-shirt inscribed with the name of one proscribed entity,
PUDEMO. He never lived to see his day in court as he died in custody possibly
from police torture.
There are other oppressive
laws also used to suppress dissent such as the law against sedition. The
president of the same organisation (PUDEMO), Mario Masuku, and the Secretary
General of its youth league, Maxwell Dlamini were also arrested in 2014 for
what the state claims were seditious statements made at a Workers’ Day rally.
In the same year their arrest
was followed by that of two columnists, Bheki Makhubu and Thulani Maseko who
were charged and later convicted for criticizing the manner in which the then
country’s Chief Justice had handled the detention of a government cars
inspector.
They remain behind bars while
ironically the Chief Justice and the presiding judge in that case have been
arrested by the country’s authorities for abuse of power and corruption. The
manner in which this arrest was conducted was also flawed as it saw the
country’s prime minister appointing himself the state prosecutor withdrawing
and reinstating charges against those who had been arrested in the state’s
publicity stunt.
Political activists are not
the only ones denied basic human rights as even those who choose to shy away
from political involvement end up on the wrong end of the country’s suppressive
institutions. Poor Swazis are evicted annually for one reason or another
without compensation from their ancestral lands. All their attempts to seek
redress from the courts are futile as the king is effectively above the law and
therefore immune from prosecution or civil charges.
RESISTANCE
The most important thing worth
considering about Swaziland is the fact that the country’s population has made
sincere attempts to change the country’s governance. As already pointed out,
these political activists are dealt with brutally which results in a general state
of despondency and fear amongst the population.
Yet despite this general fear
within the population, the country’s Mass Democratic Movement thrives
underground and continues to mobilise the country’s population to struggle
against the dictatorship. It is this brave population that convinced those
outside the country to provide solidarity to the struggle in Swaziland.
BOYCOTT
It is in this spirit of
solidarity with the people of Swaziland that the Swaziland Solidarity Network
[SSN] appeals to the two teams, Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates, not to
honour the invitation to participate in the Super King’s Cup. It is clear from
the name of the event that this is not just a sporting event meant to promote
goodwill but rather a political event meant to legitimise a despot who has lost
credibility in the eyes of the world and the country that he rules with an iron
fist.
A brief background has been
provided into the reasons why being in bed with this despot will blot the two
teams’ record in history but should they need further information our
organisation is willing to facilitate a meeting with them to elaborate on these
issues. The very least that they can do is to hear both sides of the story
before making a decision on whether to participate in this one day political
publicity stunt or not.
For more information please
call comrade Lucky Lukhele at Tell: 011 339 3621 or cell: 072 502 4141 or
myself at 082 886 5970.
In Solidarity
__________________________
Solly”Afrika” Mapaila- SSN- National Chairperson- [South Africa Chapter]
Solly”Afrika” Mapaila- SSN- National Chairperson- [South Africa Chapter]
No comments:
Post a Comment