Danish party to support PUDEMO’s
struggle for democracy in Swaziland
Representatives of the Danish party,
the Red-Green Alliance, met with the leadership and other
representatives of the People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO)
in November. The Danes met with PUDEMO-president, Mario Masuku,
representatives of the trade federation TUCOSWA, and an array of
other people from the democratic movement in Swaziland.
“Swaziland has an absurd political
system where all power is vested in the king,” says Thomas Eisler.
He is part of the Red-Green Alliance’s Swaziland-group who visited
Swaziland in November, and has held several high-ranking posts within
the party’s administration.
During the week-long visit, the
Red-Green Alliance and PUDEMO outlined the prospects for a
partnership sponsored by the Danish Institute of Parties and
Democracy – a government-funded institute that “support[s]
political parties and multi-party systems in selected developing
countries.”
The concrete goal of the project that
will be the result of the partnership is to strengthen the
organisational and political capacity of PUDEMO. The partnership is
also meant to inform and enlighten the leadership and membership of
the Red-Green Alliance on the struggle for democratisation in a
contemporary perspective, using Swaziland as a concrete and specific
example.
“We were able to agree on areas that
PUDEMO seeks to develop,” Thomas Eisler says. “Amongst other
things, they seek to develop a more concrete political programme, for
example in relation to the economic development of Swaziland.”
PUDEMO wants an extensive and
wide-ranging democratisation of Swaziland – a country that is ruled
by King Mswati III, a corrupt and brutal absolute monarch. The
country has the lowest life expectancy in the world, the highest
HIV-prevalence in the world, and two-thirds of the population survive
on less than a dollar a day – many starving in the process.
PUDEMO is the largest political party
in Swaziland and enjoys broad public support amongst the Swazi
population, although the party is banned along with all other
parties. The Suppression of Terrorism act likens all attempts at
undermining the powers of the King to terrorism. All Swazis who
openly support PUDEMO therefore risk exclusion, as well as beatings
and torture at the hands of Swaziland’s police and security forces.
In 2010 Sipho Jele, a young PUDEMO-member, was even killed for
wearing a PUDEMO-T-shirt.
Politically, PUDEMO are a broadly
speaking a left-wing party and many of its members are inspired by
socialism. Amongst other things, the party promises a land reform
meant to empower the poor and remove the king’s monopolisation of
public land; gender-equality both legally and more informally, as
women are presently legally treated as minors, and cannot even open a
bank account without the written consent of a male relative; a
progressive tax system; and free education and healthcare for all
Swazis.
Thomas Eisler believes that PUDEMO’s struggle for democracy and socio-economic justice is achievable. “The legitimacy of Swaziland’s political system is crumbling,” he says. “There will most likely be a transitional period that will lead to democracy within a few years. The question is who will administer this transition – will it be a top-down process or will it be a popular and participatory process?”
Thomas Eisler believes that PUDEMO’s struggle for democracy and socio-economic justice is achievable. “The legitimacy of Swaziland’s political system is crumbling,” he says. “There will most likely be a transitional period that will lead to democracy within a few years. The question is who will administer this transition – will it be a top-down process or will it be a popular and participatory process?”
The Red-Green Alliance believes that a
strong PUDEMO is the best way of ensuring that the population in
general, and the poor in particular, are included in the political
process in Swaziland. “The undertakings of PUDEMO are closely
linked to their presence within Swaziland’s social movements,”
Thomas Eisler says. “It is a party that connects the struggle for
democracy with social rights and it has an activist and democratic
organisational culture. In this way PUDEMO has much in common with
the Red-Green Alliance.”
The Red-Green Alliance is a democratic
socialist electoral alliance that fights both nationally and
internationally against “corporate driven globalization, neoliberal
politics and privatization and fights for a public sector in which
people not profit are at centre.”
No comments:
Post a Comment