Police in Swaziland / eSwatini fired rubber bullets
and tear gas at striking public service workers, injuring at least 15.
It was the latest police violence at public protests
in the undemocratic kingdom ruled by King Mswati III as an absolute monarch.
Public sector workers were on the final day of a
three-day strike for a cost-of-living wage increase.
The violence happened at Mbabane after what local media called ‘a long day of peaceful protest’. Workers protested across the kingdom.
The violence happened at Mbabane after what local media called ‘a long day of peaceful protest’. Workers protested across the kingdom.
Police opened fire at workers near the Mbabane
Government Hospital on Wednesday (25 September 2019), the Swazi Observer
reported.
The 15 injured workers were treated at the hospital.
Among the shot protesters was a woman teacher who was
hit multiple times in the back and leg. She had been in the back of a car that was
carrying trade union leaders.
The Observer reported, ‘The emotional teacher
blamed the police for shooting at them saying there was no need to open fire to
an unarmed group of protesters.’
It added most of the workers who were injured were women
and among them were three who were hurt while escaping from the police shots.
‘One teacher who was interviewed said she was trying
to take cover from the police shots, but she fell to the ground and when she
got up, it was when she got hit by the rubber bullet,’ the newspaper reported.
In the past police fired
live bullets, rubber bullets and teargas at workers and demonstrators who had
been legally protesting. In September 2018 during a three-day strike the
streets of Manzini, the kingdom’s main commercial city, were turned into a
‘battlefield’, according to local media. The Swazi
Observer, a newspaper in effect owned by King Mswati, said the bus rank
in Swaziland’s major commercial city was ‘turned into a warzone as stun
grenades, teargas, teasers and rubber bullets became the order of the day’.
The Times
of Swaziland , the kingdom’s only independent daily newspaper, called
it an ‘open battlefield’.
Armed police had been deployed across Swaziland. Videos
and photographs of brutal police attacks were uploaded on social
media. The Southern Africa Litigation Centre (SALC)
in a statement said the videos
showed ‘unlawful police actions’.
It added, ‘Several workers were wounded after police
fired stun grenades to disperse the crowd in Manzini. These police officers
then unleashed a wave of assaults against striking workers in an effort to
quell the protests.’
The Swaziland Human Rights Network UK in a statement said,
‘The violent attack on peacefully demonstrating TUCOSWA [Trades Union Congress
of Swaziland] members is reprehensible as it was a violation of their
constitutional right to freedom of assembly and expression.’
It added, ‘The Eswatini government has turned the
country into a violent police state where the security services have been
turned into tools of suppression to protect the interests of not just the
government but the regime of King Mswati III.
‘The routine use of firearms against unarmed and
peaceful demonstrators marks a dangerous and violent policy by the Eswatini
government and we call for the immediate prosecution of those involved in the
senseless brutality against workers.’
That strike came after a
series of protests and rallies which saw police violence in attempts to
suppress the protestors. Police
shot and wounded a schoolteacher at a vigil
protesting their salaries in late August. Nurses in the kingdom’s capital city
of Mbabane were
tasered during a pay protest.
Public sector workers march peacefully through
the streets of Mbabane, Photo sourced from Facebook
See also
Police Turn Swaziland City Into ‘Warzone’ as National
Strike Enters Second Day
Widespread Condemnation of Swaziland Police Brutal
Attacks on Workers
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