Swaziland’s King Mswati IIIhas failed his people in their moment of crisis.
This week the Swaziland Central Bank failed to raise enough money on the financial markets to pay public sector salaries. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) warned of ‘social upheaval’, if the economy wasn’t mended quickly.
But instead of leading the kingdom he rules as sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch, King Mswati’s only solution is to ‘pray’.
The Times Sunday,an independent newspaper in Swaziland, in a report yesterday (30 January 2011), headlined King sees no need to panic, said, ‘The King gave the country some hope that it would rise above these economic challenges. He said there was no reason to panic, urging his people to stay calm and focused. “Let us praise God, celebrate when you face challenges. Be like an eagle that faces the lightning and let us trust in God who has all our answers, God has all our blessings,” he said.
The King was leading a prayer session at Lozitha Palace for the kingdom’s survival in the face of the current economic crisis.
The Times Sunday reported that the King said Swaziland should pray earnestly to God because He rewards those who diligently seek him.
The Times Sunday said, ‘His Majesty left women in tears, shouting Hallelujah and others speaking in tongues when preaching.’
This was the only public statement the King has made directly to his subjects about the present financial calamity facing his kingdom.
There was a political overtone to the prayer meeting. Pastor Griffiths Dlamini toldthe congregation and the King, ‘People in power usually find a scapegoat when there is a crisis. They may use you, Your Majesty, as a scapegoat, not wanting to face the challenges, thus setting you against your people.’
Pastor Griffiths also prayed to God to bestow power upon the King to detect liars and detractors.
Without a hint of irony, Rev Obed Mavuso, representing the League of Swaziland Churches, ‘blasted those who pretend to be loyal to the king yet their intention was to benefit personally.
‘He said these people came to the King kneeling down and showing fake respect yet they were not what they pretended to be,’ the Times Sunday reported.
But, despite all this hyperbole, even the Times Sunday felt the need to bring its readers down to earth a bit, reporting, ‘Currently government is failing to finance some of her capital projects. Ministries have been urged to cut budgets by 24 percent. The government has introduced a voluntary exit package for civil servants who have served for 15 years and above, and are above the age of 45.
‘The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has advised government to lay off 10 000 workers.’
After the prayer meeting the Swaziland Solidarity Network (SSN) said in a statement, ‘Swazi people need to force the King out of their country. This man will not be affected one bit by the country’s economic collapse.’
SSN said government departments had been forced to cut budgets by 24 percent, but expenditure by the Royal Family remained unaffected by this and would continue to increase.
SSN said, ‘All this expenditure is meant to pamper a family that has its own personal sources of income both within the country and outside. This means that even if the government would no longer have enough to give to the King he would still be able to live in opulence.’
The European Union and the United States are ready to pull out financial support for Swaziland because it is not moving towards democracy, according to a writer in the Times Sunday, an independent newspaper.
But, Peter Kenworthy says in his stiffkitten blog, the writer Qalakaliboli Dlamini, has a reputation for getting his facts wrong.
I wrote last weekabout the striking similarity between conditions in Swaziland and in Tunisia where people took to the streets to overthrow a dictator.
Then protests moved onto Egypt. Here, ordinary people, especially the youth, bypassed the established opposition parties and took to the streets on their own account – utilising social networking to publicise their cause.
There are lessons there for Swaziland.
As with Tunisia, there are uncanny similarities between the social, economic and political situation in Egypt, prior to the uprising and the experience of Swaziland.
This was brought home to me by an editorial comment in the Observer, a Sunday newspaper in the UK, yesterday (30 January 2011). The newspaper was writing about Egypt, but it could easily have been (and might yet be) writing about Swaziland.
Here is part of what the Observer wrote. I have changed the names ‘Egypt’ to read ‘Swaziland’ and president ‘Hosni Mubarak’ to read ‘King Mswati III’. See what I mean?
Days of rage in [Swaziland] signify the end of days for [King Mswati’s] repressive and bankrupt regime. For [25] years, the [king] has held his country down through fear, secret police, emergency laws, American cash subsidies and a lamentable absence of vision and imagination. His crude, Gaullist message: without me, chaos. Now the chaos has come anyway. And [Mswati] must go.
Five days of rage on the streets of [Swaziland] have transformed the way [Swaziland] sees itself. For years, they said it was impossible. The regime was too powerful, the masses too apathetic, the security apparatus too ubiquitous. Like eastern Europeans trapped in the Soviet Union's cold, pre-1991 embrace, they struggled in the dark, without help, without hope. Movements for change, such as [PUDEMO], were brutally suppressed. Courageous dissidents such as [Mario Masuku] were harassed, beaten and imprisoned.
Yet all the time, pressure for reform was rising. Every day, higher prices, economic stagnation, poverty and unemployment, political stasis, official corruption and a stifled, censored public space became less and less tolerable. Every day, impatience with the regime's insulting insouciance bred more enemies. Hatred seeped like poison through the veins of the people. Until, at last, in five days of rage, as if as one, they cried: ‘Enough!’ And now, [Mswati] must go.
Fittingly, [Swaziland’s] youth led the way against the old order, using not guns or bombs but the arsenal of 21st-century information technology: social media, mobiles, texts and emails. The Paris mob of Bastille notoriety became, through peaceful evolution, the flash mob of Tahrir Square. They espoused no leaders. They wrote no plans. In fast-moving, separate but interconnected street offensives, they out-thought, outfoxed and outran the police.
With the once omnipotent security forces looking beatable, [Swazis] of all backgrounds rose to join the fight: students, trade unionists, women, rights activists, Islamists and, crucially, the great workers’ army of [Swaziland’s] employed and unemployed. Here, truly, was people power in all its magnificent might. Here was democracy in the raw. Here was the legitimacy of a [Swaziland] freed of its old fears and suddenly alive to its changing destiny. In five days of rage, they seized control of their country’s future. And so, inevitably, [Mswati] must go.
I wrote last week about how social network sites, such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, played a big role in supporting the Tunisian uprising. Since then social networking-supported protests have spread to other Arab nations, including Egypt and the Yemen.
After my post was published I received some emails asking if I could give some practical tips on how to get the message out to mainstream media using social networking.
Happy to oblige. Here is a ‘four-step’ guide. In my original post I was writing about how social networking could be used during an uprising. Of course, you don’t have to wait for the spark that ignites the revolt in Swaziland; you can get your own messages out before that happens and, who knows, maybe hasten the spark along a little.
STEP ONE: SET UP ACCOUNTS
If you haven’t already got them, set up social network accounts. Do this now; don’t wait for the crisis to start. Learn how to upload to the sites and how to communicate with others from your sites.
There are a number of social network sites. These are the most popular and are the ones that journalists search when they are looking for information.
Blogs. There are many different sites where you can set up a blog. Personally, I have found the Google ‘blogger’ to be easy to use and efficient. http://www.blogger.com
STEP TWO: COLLECT YOUR MATERIAL
There are three types of material that journalists will want: video, photographs and words (text). Television is the best way of getting the message out and this means you should try to get video material whenever possible. If that’s not available, photographs are the next best thing. You will need also to write a short piece to explain what the video and / or pictures show.
To do this you need a certain amount of equipment. Small handheld video cameras are excellent for this. If you don’t already have this, check around with people you know to see if they have one you can use.
Most digital cameras that take still photographs have a feature that allows you to shoot some moving images.
Lastly, some cell (mobile) phones allow you to take photos and video. The technical quality of these is usually quite poor (especially when broadcast over television). Only use these as a last resort.
Remember you are trying to interest journalists in your cause and the best way to do this is to make it as easy as possible for the journalists to understand what it is you want to say. So, edit your material savagely. That means if you have been on a protest march and have 20 minutes of video, don’t upload all 20 minutes. Take from it the most dramatic images that you have, for example, something to show how big the demonstration was and add to this some ‘action’ – police brutality, tear gas and rubber bullets are better than people standing on a stage making speeches.
STEP THREE: UPLOAD YOUR MATERIAL
You need an Internet connection that is fast enough to enable you to get online and upload video and pictures. In Swaziland, in normal circumstances, the Internet connection can be very slow and this can make uploading difficult. My own experience of this in Swaziland is that it is easier to upload during the night time (when fewer people elsewhere are trying to get on the Internet). This problem of Internet speed is another reason why you should keep your video as short and to the point as possible.
There are some places in Swaziland that have their own satellite Internet provision. They have it because they need to have fast access to the Internet for their own business etc.
Find out where such Internet connections exist and see whether it is possible to use them. If there is a major civil unrest, one possible source of Internet access will be foreign embassies in Swaziland. If the Swazi regime is about to be toppled (or has been toppled) foreign nations might be willing to allow access to their facilities. Of course, not all foreign embassies will be on the side of the people. I suspect the Americans will be a better bet than the Kuwaitis.
A possible alternative might be to take your material across the border to South Africa, but in a major crisis this might not be possible (if, for example, the borders are closed).
The present ruling regime in Swaziland might try to block access to your Internet sites. We have seen in the past that the PUDEMO site has been closed to access from within Swaziland.
It is not possible for the Swazi Government to block access from outside the kingdom. To ensure that you are able to access your Internet sites from within Swaziland set up a proxy server. A proxy server is simply a server in one country that you can access from another. Using a proxy server allows you to bypass censorship.
To set up a proxy server input ‘proxy server’ into any Internet search engine (e.g. Google) and you will be taken to dozens of different sites that offer the service. Some are free of charge (but I am told these tend to be less efficient than ones you pay a fee for). Personally, I have servers in nine different countries (catch me if you can ...).
STEP FOUR: GET NOTICED
Once you have your material online you need to tell journalists that it is there. If journalists already know there is an uprising in Swaziland they will search social network sites to see if anyone is putting material up. This can be a bit ‘hit and miss’ so to save them the bother and to make sure they find your material you should contact them directly.
In order of priority go for the television stations first; then the news agencies and finally individual newspapers.
The world’s most visible TV stations go out of their way to ask people to alert them to news stories and materials. These are the three biggest international TV news organisations. Email them with brief details of what you have and give them the internet address (URL) where you have uploaded the material.
After contacting the TV stations go for the international news agencies. These agencies want video, photographs and words. Put your message in the body of the email, do not send attachments.
Democracy activists will already probably have contacts in the media in southern Africa, but if you are searching for newspapers elsewhere go to http://www.world-newspapers.com/for lists and websites.
You might like to consider setting up your own online ‘news room’. This is technically simple to do. All you need is to set up one Internet site and get all the people you know who are out videoing and photographing to send a copy of their material to that site (the online news room) – as well as sending it to their own site.
The advantage of the online newsroom is that it acts as a ‘one-stop shop’ for journalists. Once they know that it exists and that it is efficiently collecting material about the crisis, it will be their first port of call when seeking updates on the situation.
Setting up a news room will require cooperation between all the pro-democracy groups and activists. It will need to be fast and efficient and cannot be hindered by political in-fighting and petty bureaucracy.
If the online newsroom proves difficult to organize, you can send material to the already-existing website Swazi Media Commentary (www.swazimedia.blogspot.com). This site has been in operation for nearly four years and is already widely read by (among others) journalists all over the world.
Remember, that the object is to get the pro-democracy message out far and wide, by using conventional media outlets. This means you must be aware what it is that this media want and how to give it to them.
When you post video or pictures up to the Internet also put up a short explanation of what they show – where they were taken, when it happened and what the demonstration etc. they show was about.
If you have no video or pictures, and you want to send a report as text, that’s OK, but this has less chance of getting publicised than the video and pictures.
Whatever the reason for your writing, remember to think like a journalist. Keep what you have to say short and simple. Give information about what is happening and not rhetoric (keep the exhortations to overthrow the system for the political rallies). Be calm in your tone. Write in ‘proper’ English and not SMS-speak.
Give the journalists as many different ways of contacting you as possible if they have questions.This could include information about email address, Facebook sites etc, as well as cell phone numbers.