King Mswati
III has broken his promise to the Swazi people when he said he would freeze the
Royal budget to help his subjects during the present economic crisis in his
kingdom.
Instead,
figures revealed publicly for the first time today (8 March 2013) show in fact he has taken a 13 percent
increase in Royal spending for the financial year just starting.
In October
2012, Swaziland Finance Minister Majozi Sithole told international media the king
had asked him to freeze the Royal budget.
But, in the
budget Sithole delivered last month (February 2013) spending on ‘royal emoluments and the civil
list’ rose to E238 million (US$34 million) for the year 2013 / 14, from
E210,000 in the previous financial year.
In October
2012, the Times of Swaziland reported
that Sithole told CNN that the king wanted to do his bit to help his kingdom
that is facing economic meltdown.
Sithole was
reported by CNN
saying, ‘I brief him [the king], he has concerns and he will, as he did
this year, say whatever you work don’t even increase my budget because I
understand the fiscal situation.’
But, Sithole
hid the truth from the Swazi people when he presented his recent budget. No
reference was made by Sithole in public statements in parliament or elsewhere to
the increase in the king’s budget.
Media in
Swaziland had access to the full budget estimates which contained information
about the increase in the king’s budget but refused to publish it. State media
in the kingdom are heavily censored and the private media censors itself when
reporting about the king
King Mswati
rules Swaziland as sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch.
The increase
in the king’s budget comes at the same time when Sithole announce the government
could only afford to increase welfare grants to the elderly by E20 to E220 per
month.
King Mswati has
13 wives and a royal family that is so large nobody is quite sure of its exact
size.
He has taken
huge increases in his slice of the Swaziland budget in recent years.
In the Swazi
national budget introduced in February 2012 King Mswati and his royal family received
E210 million a year from the Swazi taxpayer for their own use. This was the
same amount they got in the financial year 2011/12, but was an increase of 23 percent
over 2010/11 and a 63 percent compared with what the king took from his
subjects in 2009/10.
The king's
office, which manages the royal trust fund and business arm Tibiyo Taka Ngwane,
which is not taxed and does not use its profits for ordinary Swazis, is to get
E5 million this year – the same as last year.
Observers
note that the king has had many chances in the past to cut back on his spending
and reduce the amount of money he takes from his subjects, but so far has in
fact increased his budget, rather than reduced it. In 2011, as Swaziland
hurtled towards financial meltdown Sithole in his budget demanded 10 percent
budget cuts (later increased further) from government departments, but in the
same budget the amount of money given to the king increased by 23 percent.
All this is
happening while seven in ten of Swaziland’s tiny 1 million population live in
abject poverty earning less than US$2 a day; three in ten are so hungry they
are medically diagnosed as malnourished and the kingdom has the highest rate of
HIV infection in the world.
Despite the
poverty of the kingdom, King Mswati continues to live a lavish lifestyle. He
has 13 palaces, fleets of top-of-the-range Mercedes and BMW cars and at least
one Rolls Royce.
In 2012 he
acquired a private jet, estimated to cost US$17 million. He refused to say who
had paid for it, leading to speculation that the money came from public funds.
The king
continues to travel abroad in style. In May 2012 he
went to London to visit Queen Elizabeth II for lunch on a trip estimated to
cost US$794,500.
The previous
year he was in London with a party of 50 people for the wedding of Prince
William and Kate Middlelton, staying at a US$1,000 per night hotel on a trip
that was also estimated
to cost US$700 000 for the hire of a private jet to take the king and his
party from Swaziland to the UK.
In 2012
Queen LaMotsa, the second of the king’s wives, stayed at a Johannesburg hotel
on a personal trip at a cost
of US$60,000 a month.
In July
2012, some of the king’s 13 wives went on a shopping trip to Las Vegas, where
66 people reportedly
stayed in 10 separate villas – each costing US$2,400 per night. The party
were reported by South African newspapers to have travelled by private jet
which might have cost US$4.1 million.
In August
2009, five of King Mswati’s wives went on a shopping
trip through Europe and the Middle East that cost an estimated US$6
million.
In 2009,
Forbes magazine estimated that King Mswati himself had a personal fortune worth
US$200 million. Forbes also said King Mswati is the beneficiary of two funds
created by his father Sobhuza
II in trust for the Swazi nation. During his reign, he has absolute
discretion over use of the income. The trust has been estimated to be
worth US$10 billion.
King Mswati
also holds ‘in trust for the Swazi nation’ the profits of Tibiyo
Taka Ngwane, an investment fund with extensive shares in a number of
businesses, industries, property developments and tourism facilities in
Swaziland. This money is supposed to be used for the benefit of the people but
the vast majority is actually used for the king’s own personal use.
See also
NO SACRIFICE
FROM KING MSWATI
IMF CALLS
FOR SACRIFICE FROM KING
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