NEHAWU SUPPORTS SWAZI ACTION

National Education Health & Allied Workers Union, South Africa

Statement

2 September 2011

NEHAWU supports the Swaziland Global Week of Action

NEHAWU offers its total support to the planned Swaziland Global week of action set to take place between the 5-9th of September 2011. Our union will be mobilizing workers and encouraging all South Africans to support the people of Swaziland in their fight for social equality and economic emancipation.

We are also concerned by the reports coming out of the Swazi Kingdom that the royal family has done nothing to moderate their wasteful expenditure even though they have asked South Africa to lend them R2.4 billion because of their country’s precarious financial condition.

We find it abominable that Mswati and his rapacious family are incessantly throwing parties and taking expensive vacations while many poor man and women of Swaziland are forced to go to bed hungry and are struggling to afford medication in a country ravaged by the Aids pandemic.

This global week of action should be used by all freedom loving people of the world to send a clear message to the ruling Swaziland elite that their time is coming and the world will not sit idle while they brutally oppress the entire nation.

The people of Swaziland need to be more united now than ever before if they have any hope of bringing democracy to their country. It is a material fact that progress can only be achieved through action and sometimes confrontation, so the people of Swaziland owe it to themselves and the next generation to make a united stand against this corrupt and brutal dictatorship.

The Arab Spring has shown that it is possible to stand up and depose even the best armed and well resourced tyrants, as long as the working class is united in their quest for freedom. The world dictators’ illusion of invincibility has been shattered by the force of resistance and perseverance of a working class that is fed up with rampant corruption and brutal oppression. It is time for the world to act against this medieval system that allows people to rule over others using only their birthright as a qualification.

The union is fully behind the struggle to emancipate the oppressed people of Swaziland and we call on all people around the world to support the efforts of the working class to free themselves from the clutches of this brutal and corrupt regime.