By Wandile Dludlu
Africa-Press – Eswatini. Every Government in practice either uplift the majority of her citizens out of poverty, ignorance or deliberately create a reserve army for exploitation while empowering the few to sustain a particular enclave out-of the available limited resources of a Nation for the benefit of a specific elite at the expense of the majority inspired by racial, cultural, religious and or ethnocentric reasons depending on one case to the other.
In eSwatini for not only fifty-eight(58) years of independence but actually, since 1750 we are led by the royal elites who were later thoroughly captured by white foreign settler colonial predators.
These two(2) share one thing common; monopolizing the natural endowment and all such critical resources for the benefit of either the Swazi traditional aristocracy as led by the Monarchy as well as the international and local business few who owns the means of production for themselves.
Tinkhundla Government as such has been transformed into a vehicle for mass transit of resources from emaSwati to private hands, they do this over the years, by deliberately not building state capacity to provide goods and services to the public.
The Tinkhundla Government is far less involved in the business day to day affairs of providing key goods and services, but open room and space for private enterprise to take full exploitation of opportunities to provide even key services which normally are supposed to be in the armbit of any Government worth it salt in driving development, economic growth and citizens empowerment.
We have thus seen services like electricity, water, strategic infrastructure projects as well as comparative advantageous sectors of the economy fall in the hands of private sector connected to the same royal family and its international allied business bloc.
In essence, this led to development trajectory of this beautiful land to an Irish coffee scenario, where emaSwati with their utmost resources, natural and otherwise worked for literally five(5) decades but, have far less to show for it.
As Nation, we have uncontrollable basic services cost owing to over reliance on foreign direct investments, negative trade balance sheet and worse institutionally privatized strategic sectors of the economy.
In simple terms, emaSwati don’t own the sugar production, a multi billion per-annum entity, literally private business individuals make nothing less than R7billion per-year from the best soils in the country.
This agricultural comparative advantage in not Swazi terms but regional continental analysis as per SADC Spartial Development research done two decades ago, at the expense of the majority of Swazis.
Emaswati lost an opportunity to take partial if not full advantage of the accruals of the best soils that is benefitting none Swazis not only in the sugar production, but tree plantation across almost all our fertile soils under Shiselweni, Manzini and Hhohho Region, Ezulwini, Malkerns Sdvokodvo and greater part of Lubombo grows Citrus fruits, animal husbandry to name but a few.
Why all these businesses opportunities today almost sixty(60)years of so called Independence with highly educated indigenous Swazis in agri-business we don’t have at least fifty or sixty percent ownership and or partnership with this outsiders, who one day can close shop and pursue profits elsewhere owing to whatever market projections they can make for themselves.
Indeed, we don’t own the key companies and or productions that informs our trading with the very world markets.
In 2007, the World Bank sanctioned by same Tinkhundla government we are told today is not an enemy of emaSwati, concluded a feasibility study about the viability of converting the only national referral Mbabane Government hospital into a Medical School Academy which would significantly increase its treatment capacity, facilities and high-level expectees.
This was a strategic response to the emerging outside referral bourn out of at first Government workers medical scheme soon to be a cash- cow under the auspices of what unplanned, unsustainable response called “Phalala Fund” once again Tinkhundla abandoned the medical school option, ran with steal now in the pretext of “Kuphalala” later building their own private hospitals wherein Princes and Princesses together with their business associates have emerged shareholders, Board members to the detriment of public healthcare system.
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