By Zweli Martin Dlamini
Africa-Press – Eswatini. While illegal guns remain a danger to our society, the reputation of the eSwatini police was long tainted for them to demand the surrender of illegal weapons from members of the public, shortly after shooting and killing innocent civilians merely for demanding democracy.
National Commissioner Vusi Masango, a former Head of the Operational Support Services Unit(OSSU) is among the senior police officers who allegedly killed many innocent civilians and on Wednesday, he urged the public to surrender illegal guns because he doesn’t want to be killed.
Maybe another reason why Masango urged the public to surrender alleged illegal guns is that, he doesn’t want those he was employed to protect including King Mswati, to be killed, the call to surrender illegal guns is not in the interest of public safety and security.
The question is:if you don’t want or you are afraid to be killed, why do you kill another human being merely for having a different political view?.
Personally, if I can catch a thief looting or stealing food in my fridge, I cannot kill that hungry citizen but I can call the police to enforce the law not to torture or kill that suspect.
Police and other security officers with the help of foreign mercenaries, killed innocent civilians and later claimed they were looting but, even if they were looting, there was no justification to kill them.
King Mswati is looting billions of public funds almost everyday in this country but he is still alive.
But in my experience as a journalist who was once abducted by the police, I’ve learnt that members of the law enforcement agency are actually afraid when a gun, is suspected to be in the hands of another person.
What actually creates fear among the police is what they expirienced during the unrest, they realized that,some citizens are also capable of shooting and killing police officers when pushed to the corner or when they feel threatened.
State police officers want a monopoly over violence, they want to torture, assault or shoot citizens knowing that, they don’t have anything to protect themselves from State brutality.
In my view, eSwatini must hold a political dialogue and/or democratic elections and thereafter, the police must maintain law and order as servants of the people not agents of an undemocratic Government or King Mswati.
Illegal guns are a threat to a peaceful society but the police have given citizens the reason to own illegal guns and I will not be surprised if information could emerge suggesting that, there are guns hidden somewhere to be used during another political unrest, the possibility is very high.
Police in this country are known killers, they invade homes for political activists with guns, traumatize children and innocent family members.
I am sure they wouldn’t like their children to be exposed to violence and trauma but they do it to others with impunity.
Now, they are calling for the surrender of illegal guns, I would suggest a political dialogue first as means to resolve the ongoing political differences.
It’s true that, illegal possession of guns remain a danger because we might witness assassinations or killings either politically motivated, linked to business deals or domestic violence, we don’t want that in this country.
We are related and it’s not difficult to dialogue in the interest of our country but instead, we are seeing the hunting and killing of human rights defenders by the police.
Guns must be used to protect the State from foreign invaders not to kill citizens, even the police officers who were killed during the unrest are citizens of this country, there was no reason for a political conflict that could have been avoided through a dialogue to reach that stage.
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