LONDON, Jul 26 (IPS) – Two politicians have simply been sentenced to lengthy jail phrases in Eswatini. Their crime? Calling for democracy.
Mthandeni Dube and Bacede Mabuza, each members of parliament (MP) on the time, have been arrested in July 2021 for participating in a wave of pro-democracy protests that swept the southern African nation. A 3rd MP, Mduduzi Simelane, stays topic to an arrest warrant after going into hiding.
Dube and Mabuza have been detained since their arrest, and have reportedly been bodily assaulted, denied medical therapy and prevented from seeing their legal professionals whereas in custody. Final yr they have been discovered responsible on fees together with homicide, sedition and terrorism. Now they know their destiny: Mabuza has been sentenced to 25 years and Dube to 18. Because the sentencing, Mabuza, who has a medical situation that wants a particular weight loss program, has reportedly been denied meals in jail.
Dube and Mabuza are political prisoners. That they had no hope of a good trial, and their legal convictions had no foundation in actuality. Eswatini’s legal justice system does the bidding of the nation’s dictator and Africa’s final absolute monarch, King Mswati III. For nearly 4 many years, Mswati has dominated his kingdom with an iron fist. Mswati is constitutionally above the regulation, appoints the prime minister and cupboard and might veto all laws. He additionally appoints and controls judges, who’re routinely deployed to criminalise those that problem his energy.
Dube and Mabuza plan to attraction however know the chances are stacked in opposition to them.
Ongoing crackdown
The 2021 protests for democracy posed the largest menace but to Mswati’s untrammelled energy. His response was brutal. No less than 46 individuals have been killed as safety forces opened fired on protesters. Leaked footage revealed that it was Mswati who commanded the safety forces to shoot to kill and ordered the arrest of the pro-democracy MPs.
Whereas peaceable protesters like Dube and Mabuza have been criminalised, in distinction nobody has confronted justice for the state-sanctioned killings. And the hazards confronted by pro-democracy activists haven’t subsided. In January 2023, Thulani Maseko, a human rights lawyer and a number one democracy campaigner, was shot useless in entrance of his household. In addition to heading the important thing community of teams calling for a peaceable transition to democracy, he was the 2 MPs’ lawyer.
His killing got here simply hours after Mswati warned democracy activists that mercenaries would ‘cope with’ them. Nobody has been held to account for the crime, whereas Maseko’s widow, Tanele Maseko, has confronted harassment. In March she was arrested and her passport and cellphone have been confiscated when she returned to Eswatini from South Africa.
The authorities have continued to arrest, abduct and detain activists, and others have survived evident assassination makes an attempt and arson assaults. Mswati’s newest prime minister has warned the media they could face tighter regulation. The state has additionally used violence to repress additional protests. An election was held in 2023 however, as normal, political events have been banned and candidates needed to undergo a range course of designed to exclude dissenting voices.
With authoritarian rule and the flexibility of these in energy to disregard individuals’s calls for come corruption and impunity. Most of Eswatini’s 1.2 million individuals reside in poverty however Mswati and the royal household get pleasure from huge wealth and lavish existence, paid for by the proceeds of the most important belongings they immediately management.
No dialogue
The nationwide dialogue Mswati promised in response to the 2021 protests by no means occurred. As a substitute, he held a Sibaya – a standard gathering the place he was the solely particular person allowed to talk.
Mswati solely promised to carry a dialogue after South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa intervened. South Africa has a transparent function to play right here: it borders Eswatini on three sides, is by far its largest buying and selling associate and is dwelling to lots of its exiled democracy activists, whereas Mswati has additionally reportedly imported South African mercenaries. The Southern African Growth Neighborhood (SADC) can be purported to be concerned. However there’s been little stress for motion from South Africa and Eswatini has labored to hold itself off SADC’s agenda.
South Africa and SADC ought to remind Eswatini of its obligations underneath the worldwide and African treaties it has adopted, together with the African Constitution on Human and Peoples’ Rights. The federal government should roll again its repression, together with the legal guidelines on public order, sedition and terrorism used to jail Dube and Mabuza. Releasing the 2 of them can be an excellent begin.
Andrew Firmin is CIVICUS Editor-in-Chief, co-director and author for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.
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