Africa-Press – Eswatini. The Prime Minister, Cleopas Dlamini, has assured the nation that the much-anticipated national dialogue will definitely take place and that the dialogue committee would be known in due course.
This comes in the wake of growing impatience, particularly from the pro-democracy camp, and the nation at large, caused by the lack of information on the details of this process. Lest we forget, this was necessitated by the political unrest, which started mid last year and has continued, albeit in a deescalated manner, to this day. This unrest led to the destruction of millions worth of property, loss of lives and maiming of people from all walks of life. To this day, there has been no government led investigation on the deaths and injuries of scores of emaSwati, which the State initially attributed to mercenaries. It is a known fact that heavily armed security personnel were at the forefront of the offensive, against unarmed emaSwati, mostly young people, who had come out to express their frustrations on the government’s failures in a plethora of areas.
A government that had found it politically expedient to ban citizens from exercising their constitutional right to deliver petitions to their chosen parliamentary representatives. Fast forward to today, we have not heard from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Troika team that came to the country to do a preliminary assessment. A report was reportedly put together but has been made the exclusive preserve of the eyes of a few. This gives credence to the notion many in the region hold, that SADC has become a boys’ club and that little can be expected from this regional bloc in exorcising our demons. It would appear that they have left everything in the hands of this government, whose hands are still dripping with the blood our fellow emaSwati. Their silence, at least, is giving that impression. While government is obviously an important player in this process, it cannot be the only dominant player.
Some within the progress formations have stated unequivocally that Sibaya cannot be the appropriate forum for this process, government is choosing to close its ears and continue behind closed doors, to prepare for a process that may likely not receive the support of the majority of emaSwati, if this, as it appears, will take that tired vusela process which have failed to give us real peace. By the look of things, this will be another royal project, led by princes, princesses and apologists of the tinkhundla regime, and will likely be drawn out. If this country is to have a serious dialogue that will bring about lasting peace and enjoy the support of emaSwati, the government cannot go about it this way. First, we delayed the process and deferred it to sometime after Incwala. It’s been a week after that, and still there is nothing concrete. The government went ahead to allocate a whopping E22 million in the budget speech, without even giving anything away on how this money would be spent, save for only stating that it was for Sibaya.
Government cannot make this its project where it gets to determine all modalities without involving other stakeholders. If it continues this way, this may fail even before it starts. Government is not going into this dialogue by itself but with an array of interests whose views are extremely critical at this stage of preparations. What should otherwise be happening now is that government should be leading efforts, working with all key stakeholders, to put in place a framework of how best this process can be handled. Efforts should also be made to get a sense of how similar processes have been handled around the world. Eswatini is not the only country that has had to undergo dialogue, or negotiations, as others would prefer to call it. Surely, we have cases studies that can be referenced so that we adopt the best approach for our context.
We should also get it in our minds that, while we are sovereign State, and are, admittedly unique in many ways, (most which are counter-productive), we live in a global community and cannot do things without adopting international best practices. In all honesty, Sibaya will not work. That platform has never been ideal for dialogue, in its truest sense. If we want a smokescreen for a dialogue, so that we can tick a box and hoodwink the world into believing that we are a nation that prides itself in dialogue, then let us go ahead with the ways we’ve been doing things and see if we will get the peace we say we want. An awful lot is at stake here than our leaders realise. Word of advice from lowly me, let’s rethink this whole process. Government should not be having this headache by itself.
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