Congratulations to the Times of Swaziland for having the courage to tell the Swazi people about the extreme wealth held by their King, Mswati III.
The Times reported the findings of a survey by US-based Forbes into the wealth of the world’s monarchs. Forbes found that King Mswati had a net worth of 200 million US dollars (about E1.4 billion).
Forbes publishes its list of richest royals each year in August. Last year, as I have written previously, the Times, along with the rest of the Swazi media, ignored the news, even though it was published across the world.
According to the Forbes’ report, the amount of King Mswati’s wealth has remained unchanged since last year.
There appears to be a new spirit of openness at the Times. You may not see much of it in the newspaper itself, but it is clearly there on its website. When you consider how restrained the media are in Swaziland when it comes to criticising the monarchy, the fact that the Times has allowed readers to leave comments on its website about the king’s wealth is nothing less than extraordinary.
The report appeared on Monday (25 August 2008) and when I visited the website today (27 August 2008) here are some of the comments I found. It seems to me they express a real anger from readers about the behaviour of King Mswati III.
King Mswati is actually broke. The money he spends belongs to the Swaziland Government which he owns. He has invested most if not all of his money in projects like Millennium Projects, Smart Partnership, Paying a deposit on a plane, Educating his wives and children and also buying beautiful art pieces from Christies Auctions. King Mswati is not yet a failure, but he definitely has not been a success.
ITS HIGH TIME SOMETHING IS DONE ABOUT THIS FOOL OF A KING, HOW CAN HE HAVE SO MUCH WEALTH WHEN EVERYONE ELSE IS SUFFERING IN THAT GODFORSAKEN COUNTRY, WE NEED TO DETHROWN HIM IN SEND HIS ASS PACKING TO THE NEAREST JAIL, THE BLOODY IDIOT.
This is not your king. He is the king of his immediate family and the many hang-oners.
THIS KING OF THEIRS SHOULD BE JAILED FOR THEFT. WHERE IS HE EMPLOYED? HE IS RICH BECAUSE OF HIS DAILY CRIMINAL ACTIVITIES OF STEALING MONEY FROM THE NATIONS COFFERS.
How I wish some of that wealth was used to develop our way underdeveloped country or build a new tertiary institution.
I could comment but they'll [presumably, the Times] just remove my comment like they did last one! Pathetic!
It so sad to see that our King is one the richest monarchs in the world while his people are suffering. Swaziland suffers from a lack of basic services such as free health care, education yet our king is estimated to be worth R1.4billion. What a terrible thing greed can do to a nation...It amazes me that the government is spending millions of emalengeni on a short lived event such as 40/40 yet they cannot pay our doctors, nurses, teachers the salaries they deserve. The government hospital is in a terrible state, yet new BMWs are being bought for Lord knows what... What a lot R1.4billion could do to help our nation... Just a thought...
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