SWAZI GOVERNMENT CASE 'HOPELESS'

Some of the mystery surrounding the reason for the acquittal of Mario Masuku on a terrorism charge has been lifted.

Mbutfo Mamba, the High Court Judge who halted the trial only five hours into a trial that was expected to last several days, says the prosecution’s case was ‘hopeless’.

In his formal ruling he said that the prosecution claimed that Masuku, the President of the banned People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO), contravened the Suppression of Terrorism Act when after a failed bomb attempt he told a funeral gathering ‘they will continue with the bombings’.

The judge said the prosecution failed to make clear who the ‘they’ referred to in the statement were.

Put simply, the prosecution failed to provide evidence that the words Masuku used were actually an incitement to anyone.

The judge’s ruling adds to the humiliation heaped on to the Swazi Government when the case was halted last month (September 2009). The High Court was faced with incoherent statements by witnesses and what even the Swazi Observer, the newspaper in effect owned by King Mswati III, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch, called ‘a series of dramatic errors.’

The Swaziland Director of Public Prosecutions Mumcy Dlamini was particularly at fault in presenting a dire case.

In his ruling Judge Mamba gave the government a lesson in English grammar on the wording of the indictment.

‘It is, unfortunately, not a model of clarity. It offends against one of the primary rules of English grammar. It uses the pronoun “they” without any first reference to the object to which it refers. In short, it does not explain who is referred to as “they” – the persons who will continue with the bombing of the government vital structures and installations.’

He went on, ‘[Witness 4] did say in his testimony in re-examination that the accused used the words “we shall continue the bombing” of government structures. This was, however, clearly an afterthought and a desperate attempt to mitigate or ameliorate the hopelessness of the evidence by the Crown.

‘All the three crown witnesses testified that the accused called the deceased a hero. His heroics or heroic deeds were not spelt out or stated. The matter would certainly have been much different had the accused said he was a hero for bombing government structures. There is no evidence that he said so.’

So, humiliation heaped upon humiliation for the Swazi Government. We can all have a good laugh, but we can’t be complacent. The Swazi Government may be stupid, but my God it’s still dangerous.

For more details of the ruling click here.