AGOA PROPAGANDA FROM KING’S PAPER

King Mswati’s newspaper is once again misleading people about the reasons why the undemocratic kingdom has lost preferential trading rights with the United States.

Swaziland lost its right to export goods tariff free to the US under the Africa Growth Opportunity Act (AGOA) on 1 January 2015.  The trade privilege was withdrawn because the kingdom, ruled by King Mswati III as an absolute monarch, has not met five benchmarks on workers’ and political rights.

The Observer on Sunday, a newspaper in effect owned by King Mswati, reported former army Brigadier Commander and Border Restoration Committee member Fonono Dube saying ‘that in actual fact, AGOA is not yet gone’.

The newspaper reported, ‘He has claimed that the reason why Swaziland was being removed from AGOA was because the country was now not following the constitution that was used when we registered to AGOA in 2005. 

‘“That is the reason the US resolved to remove us from AGOA because we are now not following the constitution of the country. Swaziland is a Monarchy so the head of state is the king not the prime minister,” he emphasised. 

‘Were the country to correct this and re-submit our request to the US to be re-admitted into AGOA, “we will be re-admitted into AGOA”’. 

‘However, the former army commander believes that our loss of AGOA has nothing to do with the five benchmarks.’

The newspaper which is part of the Swazi Observer group and was described by the Media Institute of Southern Africa in a 2013 report on press freedom in the kingdom as ‘a pure propaganda machine for the royal family’ reported Dube’s comments even though it knew he was not telling the truth. 

The newspaper along with others in the Swazi Observer stable and the independent newspaper group Times of Swaziland have reported many times in the past six months the real reasoning behind the removal of AGOA.

The US withdrew Swaziland’s AGOA privileges after the kingdom ignored an ultimatum to implement the full passage of amendments to the Industrial Relations Act; full passage of amendments to the Suppression of Terrorism Act (STA); full passage of amendments to the Public Order Act; full passage of amendments to sections 40 and 97 of the Industrial Relations Act relating to civil and criminal liability to union leaders during protest actions; and establishing a code of conduct for the police during public protests.

In June 2014 the US Trade Representative Michael Froman said, ‘The withdrawal of AGOA benefits is not a decision that is taken lightly.

‘We have made our concerns very clear to Swaziland over the last several years and we engaged extensively on concrete steps that Swaziland could take to address the concerns.’

The report on Dube seems to be part of a campaign by the Observer to misrepresent the scale of the AGOA disaster. Earlier in January 2015 The Observer Sunday, Chief Editor Mbongeni Mbingo, quoted Prime Minister Dlamini saying, ‘there is no need for Swazis to behave like a major catastrophe has happened following the loss of Swaziland’s eligibility status under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA). Besides, AGOA did not benefit Swazis or the country’s economy much.’ 

This also was not true as independent reports from economists predicted that without AGOA privileges the textile industry in Swaziland, which is mostly owned by Taiwanese companies, would collapse with the loss of at least 9,000 jobs. Already more than 2,400 people have lost jobs in the textile industry as a direct result of the withdrawal of AGOA. 

In its report on Dube the Observer on Sunday also said, ‘Dube says in the bible there are no presidents nor democracy but kings. “It then means Swazis are on the right track because we have a King and we should appreciate that as Swazis.”

‘“In Swaziland, Dube added, “there is freedom not democracy.”’

See also

PM MISLEADS ON AGOA PROGRESS

http://swazimedia.blogspot.com/2014/12/pm-misleads-on-agoa-progress.html

ROYAL DECREE SHOULD STAY: SWAZI A-G

Swaziland’s Attorney-General Majahenkhaba Dlamini has said there is no need to annul a 1973 Royal Decree that bans all political parties and puts all legislative, executive and judicial power in the hands of the King.

Dlamini was reacting to a newspaper report in Swaziland that traditionalists stopped the decree being repealed when Swaziland’s Constitution came into force in 2006. He said the Constitution in effect annulled the Royal Decree.

‘Why do they [prodemocracy campaigners] want us to revoke the decree through a gazette? What if we don’t want to do that?’ the newspaper reported him saying.  

According to the Times Sunday, an independent newspaper in Swaziland, ‘influential traditionalists’ feared Swaziland ‘could become a republic if this law was repealed’.

The newspaper said preparations to abandon the Royal Decree in 2005 were far advanced and a gazette had been drawn up.

The newspaper quoted one of the traditionalists, Brigadier General Fonono Dube, who was a member of Liqoqo, an advisory council to the King, saying, ‘There was no way we could have revoked a law that establishes the country. We couldn’t have allowed the authorities of the country to annul the decree because that would have turned the country into a republic. We don’t need a president in Swaziland. We need the King.’

The Times reported, ‘The argument by the traditionalists to keep the decree in the statutes was that it was the “heart” of the country and its repeal was tantamount to killing the whole country, – the whole government machinery, thus depriving authorities of powers to govern the kingdom.’

The Royal Decree came into force in 1973 after King Sobhuza objected to his subjects electing members of a political party that was not under his control. He tore up the kingdom’s constitution that had been in place since Swaziland gained independence from Britain in 1968.

In his decree, King Sobhuza announced, ‘I have assumed supreme power in the Kingdom of Swaziland and that all Legislative, Executive and Judicial power is vested in myself.’

He added, ‘The Constitution is indeed the cause of growing unrest, insecurity, dissatisfaction with the state of affairs in our country and an impediment to free and progressive development in all spheres of life.’

He also said, ‘All political parties and similar bodies that cultivate and bring about disturbances and ill-feelings within the Nations are hereby dissolved and prohibited.’

He said, ‘Any person who forms or attempts or conspires to form a political party or who organises or participates in any way in any meeting, procession or demonstration in contravention of this decree shall be guilty of an offence and liable, on conviction, to imprisonment not exceeding six months.’

The Royal Decree was never abolished and today King Sobhuza’s son, King Mswati III, rules Swaziland as sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch. Political parties remain banned and the King choses all members of the government and the judiciary. He also chooses 10 members of the House of Assembly, allowing his subjects to select the other 55 members. No members of the Swazi Senate are elected by the people.

National elections were held in September 2013, but the full results of the voting have never been revealed publicly.

In April 2013, on the 40^th anniversary of the Royal Decree, armed police and state security forces in Swaziland broke up a series of events, including meetings, prayers and a rally, which had been called to debate the political situation in the kingdom.