Electorate must vote out criminal MPs

This is an unedited article published by The Times of Swaziland under the "As I See It" column on Jyly 31, 2013.

By Vusi Sibisi

This morning Zimbabwe goes to what could be an historic election that might see the last of President Robert Gabriel Mugabe , one of Africa’s dwindling elite class of dictators, and for this and no other reason I had elected to focus this column on that country’s election until the Tinkhundla parliament last week did the unthinkable, unlawfully gave passage to the Elections Bill.

To students of old and contemporary history, interest in the subject of Zimbabwe and Mugabe need no emphasis. This is double so at this point in time when Africa, slated to be poised to become the world’s new economic development powerhouse, is doing everything possible to clean up its political and social image and as such does not need the dictatorial relics of the past that Mugabe and a few other surviving despots represent. But then again Mugabe somewhat illuminates the kaleidoscope of the political and socio-economic intercourse that existed and still exists between the continent and its former colonial masters extending to the rest of the world.

As I see it, that Mugabe survived the 2008 elections when he appeared to have lost to Morgan Tsvangirai and has still managed to bulldoze this election on his people when the conditions on the ground are hardly conducive, with the Southern African Development Community (SADC) that was overseeing the transition managed by a government of national unity, just shows the measure of the man. The African Union (AU) was the first to pronounce on the elections, saying it believed the conditions were in place for a free, fair and credible vote.

Apparently the AU statement of approval may have been premature because it has just emerged that the voters roll is still a secret of the electoral commission. Perhaps on that basis, the SADC observer mission has ruled out the possibility of a fair and credible election. The voters roll is probably the heart of any election simply because it brings the human face to the process and without it there can be no free, fair and credible elections. Similarly, the voters roll can be manipulated in numerous ways, including but not limited to resuscitating the dead to vote, to give leverage to one party of another in a multiparty democracy.

These contradictory positions from the AU and SADC tell the whole story about Mugabe and his Zimbabwe. Oh yes, he is fond of referring to “My Zimbabwe” whenever politically fencing with the British former colonial masters he blames for everything bad that ever befell Zimbabwe. As for the AU, it seems even under new leadership of the African Commission nothing changes, it remains the relic of the old Organisation of African Unity that nurtured despots and dictatorships across the continent.

As for SADC, it lost the plot when it allowed Mugabe free reign at the end of the term of the government of national unity. Now it is rather too late in the day to cry foul. Mugabe has once more prevailed as he did through an orgy of violence after he was defeated by Tsvangirai in the 2008 presidential elections.

As I see it, SADC’s failure to rein-in Mugabe can partially be attributable to inherent dictatorial tendencies among African leaders. While they may publicly vilify Mugabe, privately they envy him for the brutality he seasonally unleashes across his country in every election year to ensure his political longevity in office. Privately that is what a majority of SADC, indeed AU, leaders aspire for but is out of reach for a majority of them because the roots of democracy are far too stronger in their countries to do as they please like Mugabe does in his Zimbabwe.

Enough about Mugabe and his Zimbabwe and back to the home front; By now even the most devoted of the obtaining political hegemony, the Tinkhundla political system that is, must be disillusioned at the wake of the latest howler by parliament in being bullied to pass the Elections Bill last week without the requisite quorum to make the passage legal. This is a sure sign that Tinkhundla political system is progressively imploding.

A joint sitting of the Houses of Assembly and Senate was last week ordered by His Majesty King Mswati III ostensibly to deliberate on the Elections Bill after disagreements between the two Houses on some aspects of the contentious proposed law. But what transpired during the joint sitting was in many ways instructive on the grim reality of the obtaining political oligarchy. It is hardly anything to be proud of in a system that has tenaciously, but falsely, claimed grassroots democratic credentials. And presiding Senate president Gelane Zwane best captured the moment, indeed embodied the virtues of the Tinkhundla political hegemony, when she declared “I have the final say, I rule”.

As I see it, the question of whether or not the proposed law will finally be enacted into law by the King and Ingwenyama even when it was unlawfully passed by the joint sitting is but academic. After all I have lost country on the number of times laws had been broken in the furtherance of private agendas of those straddling the kingdom’s political centre of power. As such I should not focus on the leadership to do the right thing because it is incapable of doing so simply because the obtaining Swazi polity is incompatible with the rule of law.

As we are in the middle of an election season, it is the electorate that needs to refocus on the kind of individuals they would like to see representing themselves in the next parliament. With an exception of a few, the majority of the current lawmakers do not deserve a second chance because they have failed the people who entrusted them with whatever little power is enjoyed by parliament. The electorate must punish these no hopers by denying them the vote as we head to elections proper in the next month or so.

On the casualty list should be those MPs who use food and money to buy votes because they suffer from intellectual deficiency to be effective in parliament and invariably are the ones who are forced to break the law at the behest of the political establishment. That is why last year’s vote of no confidence resolution on Cabinet was illegally withdrawn. That is why last week they became criminal co-conspirators with the leadership by unlawfully passing the Elections Bill. As we are by now all aware, some of the raft of proposed election laws is aimed at derailing the political careers of certain individuals who are a thorn to the ruling elite.

Tinkhundla nurtures hypocrisy

This is an unedited version of an article published by The Times of Swaziland under the ''As I See It" column on July 24, 2013.

By Vusi Sibisi

The one thing constant about the forthcoming elections is that the nation will not get to elect the Prime Minister of its choice notwithstanding an overwhelming call at last year’s Sibaya for the head of government to be directly elected by the people while the complexion of the next parliament will be determined at the polling stations.

And with the election season upon us, the talk at every nook and cranny of the kingdom is about the possible make-up of the next parliament and, by progression, the next Cabinet and government. But can the same political experiment deliver radical political changes?

At last year’s Sibaya, the People’s Parliament, convened amidst a plethora of challenges facing the Kingdom of eSwatini, amongst which was the teachers “Waya Waya” strike over wages, the people were almost unanimous on the urgent need for political transformation. And if the call for the PM to be directly elected by the people had any bearing on the political inclination of the people, this essentially translated to mean that the nation wanted the devolution of political power – from the institution of the monarch where all authority is currently resident - to the people. 

As I see it, the call by the people for an elected PM was a blatant rejection of and also a vote of no confidence on the overly glorified and protected Tinkhundla political system. That the people went further to pass a vote of no confidence on the Cabinet itself by calling for its immediate dissolution, a move later supplemented by their elective representatives in parliament, the House of Assembly, in accordance with the dictates of the national constitution, is further proof of the people’s increasing disenchantment with the obtaining political hegemony. The question is how long the system can continue to be forced down the throats of the people before reaching the point of no return.

Indeed last year’s Sibaya was probably a precursor to the systemic changing face of Swazi polity ostensibly because Sibaya had previously served to grandstand and sing the praises of the obtaining political oligarchy and those of the leadership. Thus it must have come as a shock to the leadership when Ludzidzini National Cattle Byre reverberated from the echoes of previously unheard of criticism of the obtaining political status quo. After all the political establishment had driven the fear of God into the hearts and minds of the people and gagged them into the silence that the leadership misinterpreted as a sign of peace when defending and justifying the political status quo. But if last year’s Sibaya is representative of the critical mass of the nation, we can expect a radical transformation of parliament in which the conformist voices will be replaced by critical thinkers that should naturally lead to the second political and socio-economic emancipation of the people.

As I see it, this evolution is inevitable because it is anchored on high moral values as opposed to the hypocrisy that is manifestly the campus of the obtaining political hegemony in which the truth has been sacrificed on the altar of personal aggrandizement. And the good Reverend Absalom Dlamini is partially correct in his sermon, during a prayer breakfast last Saturday at Mavuso Exhibition and Trade Centre as part of the weekend’s Somhlolo Festival of Praise 2013, that some of those orbiting the centre of political authority were great pretenders who were looking out for themselves other than the King. Indeed not many of those gravitating the political centre of power in this country are what they appear to be and can be likened to foxes in sheep’s skins. 

The Rev. Dlamini’s call that all institutions and structures should be influenced by God in order to rid the country of corruption is unlikely to find homage anywhere because it is the obtaining Tinkhundla political system that is incapable of producing anything but hypocrites given to praising the king’s apparel even when he is naked just so to curry his favour. That is what this system of government is by design only capable of producing people who are not just hostile to but enemies of the truth.

That of late we have seen the enactment of legislation amongst the raft of six proposed election laws that is targeted at derailing certain individuals from being elected cannot be described anything otherwise except that it is evil. You have to ask yourself what kind of a government can stoop so low as to enact legislation to deal with individuals who pose no threat to the nation whatsoever because certainly this cannot be said to be in the public interests. Yet not a single of these proposed laws is derived from the recommendations of last year’s Sibaya, the voice of the Swazi nation that the leadership often boasts about in international fora when singing the so-called democratic credentials of the Tinkhundla political system.

As I see it, using arms to instill fear, or what the ruling elite refers to as peace, cannot be a permanent panacea and solution to the challenges that have been facing the country in the immediate past, such as the fiscus crisis, and those that will face the nation in the future. Peace cannot be achieved by instilling fear in the people by amassing military arsenal when this country is unlikely to fight any war now or in the future. This is unsustainable for the long term because it certainly is not what God designated for this nation and anyone who says otherwise is the archetypal hypocrite that the Tinkhundla political system was designed to produce.

The Rev. Dlamini has orbited the kingdom’s political centre of power long enough to know and be able to lance the boil because he has intimate knowledge of the operations and indeed the people entrusted the responsibility of driving the country’s political machinery. I am sure he also can name and shame those who have sacrificed the truth just so as to benefit their bellies, except that in SiSwati ligama lemuntfu yinkhomo (a person’s name is sacrosanct).

Was PM's hand in CPA fraud probe innocent?

This is an unedited version of an article published by The Times of Swaziland under the "As I See It" column on July 17, 2013.

By Vusi Sibisi

Prime Minister Sibusiso Barnabas Dlamini in explaining his role in the investigations by the Anti Corruption Commission of alleged mismanagement of funds of the local chapter of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association is attempting to clear his name of having politically manipulated the investigations by painting himself as an honest broker caught in the penultimate cross-fire.

The problem in believing this is that every one of us has a history, which history defines our actions. And similarly, the incumbent PM also has a history that defines how he has conducted himself in public office. Regrettably his record is one that no one, perhaps with the exception of himself, will be proud of. It portrays a scary picture of a man fixated with himself and would stop at nothing, by hook or crook, to have his way.

I should hasten that in no way am I trying to defend those incriminated by the investigations and hopefully they will have their day in court where they will prove their innocence or otherwise.

The PM’s stated position, and indeed participation if not facilitation, in the investigations might have gone exactly how he has explained it in his interview with the Times SUNDAY. But is the PM’s explanation enough to exculpate him from culpability and to remove the widely held perception of suspected political skullduggery on his part that is motivated by a desire to end the political life of one Marwick Khumalo, the long-serving Lobamba Lomdzala Member of Parliament. After all it is common knowledge that there is no love lost between the two political protagonists.

As I see it, the timing of the arrests of those suspected to have ransacked funds of the local branch of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA), coming as it did in the middle of a general election, has naturally fueled the perception that the case was politically motivated to unseat MP Khumalo from parliament. As for the others, they are collateral victims caught in the cross-fire but still convenient for providing a false façade of the case to the public. MP Khumalo has been charged along with Senator Bhutana Dlamini, former Clerk to Parliament Sanele Nxumalo and Nompumelelo Zulu, an accountant in parliament, over the alleged misappropriation of E5.8 million from the local branch of the CPA.

Since the CPA case exploded into the public domain it triggered flashing images of some of the unsavoury cases that have a direct bearing on the incumbent PM, especially his discharge of the responsibilities and duties of his office. Needless to mention, some of his actions and indeed decisions did not augur well for the high office he occupied then and is occupying now.

The case of the forceful removal of the late Ben Zwane from the position of Clerk to Parliament at the instance of the PM has somewhat provided the unlikely backdrop to the current CPA case. That case was quite graphic in depicting the use or abuse of political power towards the achievement of certain goals and objectives. And it did not depict the incumbent PM as one who judicially exercised the political power at his disposal other than for settling personal scores with individuals he perceived to be his detractors and enemies. That, as the minister also responsible for the police, he unleashed the law enforcing agency to physically remove the late Zwane from the parliament precinct even though he was armed with and wielding a court order in the faces of police officers apparently unleashed to execute a political directive, showed that his ruthless streak knew no bounds. Not even the courts could stop him.

The Zwane case is one of many that were instructive in helping us to understand the man and his exercise of the political power of the office of the PM. These included the media, with this newspaper at one time being sanctioned with government advertisements while others were shut down for apparently refusing to conform under this very PM’s watch. Yet now, we are expected to understand and appreciate his actions in the alleged CPA fraud investigations as not having been purely apolitical but merely administrative towards enabling the Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) to do its work.

Just recently the PM somewhat acknowledged his typical disposition to using state power to deal with his detractors and critics when he informed lawmakers that government was keeping a record of all those who speak ill of and criticize government and the leadership. The intention of this was to punish those involved by, among others, marginalizing them from appointment to key public positions. God knows what other forms of punishment await those who make his list. That is why today we even see some pieces of legislation, such as the Elections Expenses Bill, that are manifestly targeted at certain individuals and political organisations to malign them from the elections.

As I see it, while the PM has explained how he came to write the letter to CPA headquarters requesting assistance to be extended to the ACC in order to complete its investigations, there is still that matter of the reshuffle of the parliamentary administration that saw then Clerk to Parliament Sanele Nxumalo being replaced by Ndvuna Dlamini. Could it be that decision was also at the instance of the ACC to enable investigations into the management of the funds of the local branch of the CPA? The answer to that question is, of course, a big no because the truth of the matter is that it was to allow the Auditor General to do an investigation.  In other words this action was pre-emptive to the subsequent investigation by the ACC that led to the arrest of the four suspects.

As I see it, the matter could have been investigated normally without creating wrong perceptions that it was targeted at someone, specifically MP Khumalo. Had this been the case, a normal investigation would have been carried out as soon as there was suspicion of wrong doing or criminality instead of invoking political authority that culminated with a reshuffle in the parliament administration.

And although some of us have long lost confidence in the judiciary of this country, hopefully the accused will have their day in court to prove their innocence.