The Government in undemocratic Swaziland takes one step
forward and two steps back in its attitude to media freedom, a leading pressure
group said.
It has held talks with a newly-created media consortium
seeking the right to freedom of expression and access to information and at the
same time continued to censor broadcasting and blocked freedom of information
legislation.
The Media
Institute of Southern Africa in its annual report on media freedom in
Swaziland just published called the creation of the Swaziland Media Consortium (SMC)
a major step forward. SMC has eight member bodies from journalists and media workers
and non-government organisations.
In its review of 2017, MISA said SMC had met with
Dumisani Ndlangamandla, Minister of Information, Communication and Technology,
to discuss legislation around freeing broadcasting and introducing a freedom of
information bill.
MISA reported, ‘The Minister also stressed the urgent
need to address media development issues, access to information and dropping standards
of journalism.’
Drafts of broadcasting legislation has been around
since at least 2013 and the Freedom of
Information and Privacy Bill since 2007.
In Swaziland political parties are banned from taking
part in elections and King Mswati III who rules as an absolute monarch chooses the
Prime Minister and government.
He also has a firm grip on broadcasting and most
printed media in the kingdom. MISA reported, ‘In the year under review, the
management of the state broadcasters perfected state media capture. In between
the programmes and news bulletins, public information officers working at the
radio channel [SBIS] played SiSwati interludes extoling the benefits of living
in a monarchy and featured songs portraying the King as the most benevolent
ruler. There is a clear perception that dissenting voices cannot be aired in
the state-controlled broadcaster.’
At a party for his 50th birthday on 19 April
2018 King Mswati wore a watch
worth US$1.6 million and a suit
studded with diamonds. Days earlier he had taken delivery of his second
private jet aircraft which with VIP upgrades
was reported to have cost US$30 million. He has 13 palaces, fleets of top
of the range Mercedes and BMW cars and he and his
family take shopping trips abroad that cost millions of dollars.
Meanwhile, seven in ten of the population, estimated
at 1.1 million people live in abject poverty on incomes less than the
equivalent of US2 per day.
MISA is not the only group to review media freedom in
Swaziland over the past year. The latest
annual report from Reporters Without Borders said there was no media freedom in Swaziland. It
ranked the kingdom 152 out of 180 in the world ranking.
In its report RWB stated
the kingdom, ‘prevents journalists from working freely and obstructs access to
information. No court is allowed to prosecute or try members of the government,
but any criticism of the regime is liable to be the subject of a prosecution.
‘For fear of reprisals,
journalists censor themselves almost systematically.’
The US State
Department in its review of human rights in Swaziland for 2017 stated that the Swazi Constitution provided for freedom of speech and press, ‘but the
King may deny these rights at his discretion, and the government severely
restricted these rights in prior years’.
It added, ‘Officials impeded
press freedom. Although no law bans criticism of the monarchy, the prime
minister and other officials cautioned journalists against publishing such
criticism with veiled threats of newspaper closure or job loss.’
See also
‘EDITOR FLEES AFTER DEATH THREAT’
SWAZI
GOVERNMENT FORCES NEWSPAPER TO CLOSE
JOURNALISTS
‘SCARED TO DO THEIR JOBS’
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