Posts Tagged ‘Politics’

B.V. Dlamini, Deputy Secretary General of the Swaziland Federation of Trade Unions speaks to Ingrida Kerusauskaite about the way forward for Swaziland.

What is the political situation in Swaziland? What does that mean to the citizens?The country is ruled under a dictatorship, where there is no separation of power: the judiciary, legislative and executive powers are all invested in the King, to the extent that the government cannot properly advise the monarch. First they have to know what he wants to hear, and then they tell him what he wants to hear, not what he has to hear. The distribution of resources in the country is very uneven: 69 percent of the population live under the poverty line, despite the fact that Swaziland is regarded as a middle income country by the international financial institutions. There are also serious violations of human rights.

Swaziland has an international reputation of being an “ideal tourist destination”. What effect does that have on the country?

There are high levels of cultural indoctrination- where culture is used in a way to ensure the Royal Family’s stronghold on power. Moreover, there has been this misplaced self-congratulatory outcome where the rulers of the country say “look, people are coming to the cultural festivities, then that means they endorse in the way we are governing, they are happy with the way that the country is being governed.”

While in other countries indoctrination manifests itself in political terms, party political ideologies, in Swaziland it is very strong in the cultural form – that we need to be seen as a cultural destination for the West. In Swaziland, you can often hear “You are not expected to behave like this, it is un-Swazi. Listen to your leaders, pray for your leaders, make sure your leaders do not have trouble in ruling the country.” I think it inhibits people’s development. I haven’t seen anybody who participates in the activities and comes out saying “my life has improved.”

People participate in these cultural activities not because they choose to, but because they are intimidated into participation by various forms of fines and sanctions. I know people who have had difficulties in acceding tertiary institutions because the traditional chief (of the village) wouldn’t sign their application for a scholarship form, on grounds that they had not been seen in some of the traditional festivities. They just say “you are not an obedient citizen, we summon people to the royal calling, and you are not there”.

I got the impression that you believed that only a democratic republic could significantly improve the situation in Swaziland. Is that true?

I think a democracy is fundamental to propel the country forward. But within the context of Swaziland, we are calling for the repeal of all oppressive laws, the separation of powers, where the judiciary must remain independent, the legislative must be able to enact proper laws that would develop the people, and the executive must run the country. We are not saying that the King must be removed, he should remain as the unifying figure and play a certain role in terms of governance, like for example in the UK.

The King’s participation in the day to day running of the country causes very serious problems. Certain projects known as “the white elephants” are very dear to the King, however destructive to the country’s economy, and no one was able to stand up and protest against them. For example we are currently building a big international airport, which we will not be able to sustain as there is not much air traffic into Swaziland.

Even now, with a small airport, we are struggling to get people to fly on the small jet stream plane between Johannesburg and Manzini, and we are building a very big international airport that will accommodate Boeing 777or Airbus 824. So who is going to fund it? A lot of public resources had to be moved as no international investors were willing to invest in the project.

The feasibility of the project states very clearly that it will be a failure. And that is just one example. Right now the King has 13 wives. I wouldn’t want to be seen to be criticizing him for the number of wives, but for the expenditure. It is becoming increasingly expensive, because each and every one of them is having a palace built for them, they all have these nice cars and escorts, they go shopping all over the globe – Las Vegas and Kuwait recently, Dubai, London, New York… just living a life of luxury, in the face of abject poverty. In the end of the day it will only work against them, because people are getting angrier and angrier, as they are hungry while seeing these people living large. I’m saying that if we democratise the country, then all these problems of poverty, dilapidated health system, poor infrastructure could be solved. We would be able to direct the resources to where they could best be utilised.

Swaziland is a member of the UN, has ratified numerous international conventions, but it seems to be abusing them?

Swaziland is a member of the United Nations, and a signatory to quite a number of international conventions and international charters, but it violates all of them. Even though Swaziland is always one of the first countries to sign any convention that comes around, it is also one of the first ones to do exactly the opposite to that particular convention. You are free to associate as long as you associate with people that agree with the government. You are free to express yourself as long as you say things that they want to hear.

The government has also signed the ILO conventions on trade workers rights and union rights, and subsequently violated them. Recently, the international trade union congress has issued a report upon the southern African countries, stating that Swaziland is the worst violator of workers rights in the region. A good example is the fact that village chiefs make their communities work their fields in the name of tradition. The leaders own subsistence farms which require labour power, so they call the people in the village to do that work. They do the work for free. It is tradition.

From the Trade Union perspective, we say that this is forced labour, and the government says “no, it is tradition”. We say that if it is tradition, then people must have a choice whether to take part or not. It mustn’t be a situation where those not wishing to participate are then punished – in the form of not being able to access certain rights and privileges.

What are the views, structures and objectives of the Swaziland Federation of Trade Unions, and why is it sometimes in a conflicting relationship with the government?

The trade union movement is actively involved in the pro-democratic struggle, calling for a multi-party democracy and a democratic constitution-making process. We want a people-driven, people-centred constitution. We advocate for the rights of workers, whose conditions are often unbearable: they work until they drop. Some have even given birth inside the factories.
We believe that such conditions are abusive, in violation of workers rights, ILO conventions and human rights. These rights are being violated by employers, with the assistance of the government. When workers go on strike, the government will send the police to beat the hell out of them. There were even cases where police agents were shooting the workers just because they went on strike, demanding better working conditions. The government said that it was “not going to tolerate that, because it will chase investors”. 

What is the situation of students in Swaziland? How effective, do you think, would be established links between students at British and Swazi universities?

The extent to which students are free in Swaziland is very limited. They face legislative challenges, because it is very difficult to register a student union in Swaziland. The country is characterised by immense poverty, which means that most people can’t pay for tertiary education.

However, there is a very limited number of government scholarships available. The problem arises out of misplaced priorities, and in order to address that problem, we have to address the problem of governance. However, student unions are told to concentrate on student, not political issues. There are also issues of academic freedom. You can’t be able to express yourself within the university while outside the gates of the university you can’t be free. You should be able to publish your views. But if those views are not favourable to the government, publishing them would be putting yourself in jeopardy. Sometimes students embark on action, but they are beaten down. The institutions themselves are a microcosm of what happens in the working class. 

What impact do links between British and Swazi university students have?

The Swazi students’ plight would be heard by the British students, who can then advocate for the cause on other platforms. Also, Swazi students are interested to know what students in Britain are learning, and whether it is similar to their curriculums. We are not used to discuss the content of our education in universities, and we often wander whether our degree is really what it takes to survive out there in the job market. Students could share their experiences, compare similar title degrees, and broaden their perspectives.

My political involvement

In March of 1988 I was involved in a protest march on Rangoon University campus, which ended with the arrest of many students, including myself. During the week of interrogation I was badly beaten and tortured, before being transferred to Insein jail for a month of incarceration.

Upon my release, I joined the ‘All Burma Federation of Students Unions’ (ABSFU) as the Secretary to the Finance Committee and to the Security and Discipline Committee. Four days after the military seized power in 18th of September 1988, the student union was informed that some demonstrators in Pegu had weapons; a situation which I was asked to investigate. However, my five companions and I were captured upon arrival, and taken to a detention centre. There we were interrogated and beaten for three days and nights without sleep. After that ordeal I was taken to Rangoon, where I was detained, interrogated and tortured in several ‘Military Intelligence Service’ (MIS) centres.

My detention, interrogation and torture

I still cannot believe that humans can inflict such Terror and pain on other human beings. At MIS-6, the special military intelligence and interrogation centre, I was bound to a chair, badly beaten with a rubber rod, burnt on the chest with cigarettes and constantly interrogated for three days. I was then taken to MIS-7, where the same pattern of ill treatment and interrogation was repeated for another two months. At these MIS centres a typical interrogation session with beatings took place in a room, with MIS officers taking turns, working two hour shifts, while I was seated in a chair, blindfolded and handcuffed. The room was dark except for one light shining
directly into my face. They asked me again and again about my life and political activities, and about the background of the ABSFU student leaders, such as Min Ko Naing, Ko Gyi, Moe Thee Zun and others.
During the following month, they used torture techniques such as “helicopter” – I was tied to the ceiling and spun round, and “riding a motorbike” – I was forced to crouch over animaginary motorbike for long periods of time.

In the end, after failing to give the answers they wanted, or sign a confession, I was blindfolded and taken to ‘Ye Kyi Aing’, where I was interrogated for a whole week non-stop, without sleep or rest. During the interrogation I was handcuffed and blindfolded so that I couldn’t see the interrogator. The blindfold was briefly taken off only for eating and drinking. Whenever I dozed off during interrogation I was beaten. If I didn’t give the proper answers, the MIS officer beat me again during and at the end of the session. Hour after hour they repeatedly asked me the same questions. I just wanted to rest. Once, I got angry and shouted to them that I wanted to rest, but they just cursed at me and asked ‘You want a fight me? Blindfolded and handcuffed?’

One night, I was blindfolded by an MIS officer and pulled with an iron chain down a path into a ditch, about 20 foot deep and 8 foot wide, containing a corpse. During the day the corpse began to decompose and stank hideously under the tropical sun. But during the night when it turned cold, I shivered and couldn’t sleep sitting next to the decomposing corpse. Each day the MIS officer lowered a container of rice and some water, telling me that if I answered his questions I would be freed. I couldn’t eat because of the unbearably foul smell of the corpse. This torture lasted for six days, after which I still hadn’t given the answers they wanted. I had become so weak that I couldn’t even speak; I completely lost my voice.

Three days or so after this horrific experience – I don’t remember exactly – I became weak and delirious, started screaming. My mind went blank. I think I must have answered their questions about my political activities and other ABSFU members because the MIS officers showed me a confession I had signed. After almost a month of this dreadful torture, when they succeeded in forcing a confession out of me, I was taken to a suburb of Rangoon, where the infamous Insein Jail is situated, known as the darkest hellhole in Burma.

The life of a political prisoner in in Insein jail

On the 9th April 1990 I was charged and tried by a tribunal without due legal procedures. The trial proceedings were little more than the recitation of the charges and the announcement of the verdict as guilty. I was charged under various sections of the 1950 Emergency Provision Act, and found guilty of association with and being a member of an unlawful organisation. I was sentenced to seven years of hard labour.

I was sent to block no.5 of Insein Jail, together with various kinds of criminals, thieves and rapists. People like me, who were imprisoned for political reasons, were treated even worse than the criminals.
On my first day I was put into the ‘Lesson’ or ‘Example’ Room – a room twenty-six by one hundred feet, crammed with over two hundred prisoners, common criminals and prostitutes, and kept there for two days. The room was used by the prison authorities to ‘give lessons’ that is, to punish and demoralise the political prisoners. Every prisoner was beaten without reason. To intimidate and abuse political prisoners like me, the guards used foul language whenever they slapped, kicked and beat the criminals. I felt as if my ears were being raped with the filthiest name-calling I had heard in my life.

Soon after my arrival in prison, other student political prisoners and I started to demand our legitimate rights. We went on hunger strike on the 1st of May 1990 (Labour Day). We asked to be allowed to read newspapers and other literature, and for an end to the beatings of all prisoners and the use of humiliating poun san (positions of deference all prisoners must perform for wardens). Just one hour after we had started our hunger strike we were taken out of the block, told that we were breaking prison rules and ordered call off our strike. We refused. The guards then put hoods over our heads, and between our ankles they fixed eighteen-inch leg irons with chains, so that we could hardly walk. Finally they beat us and put us in solitary confinement. I was given additional torture for asking for prisoners’ rights.

On the 8th August 1992 I received two more months’ special punishment. That time my ‘crime’ was singing political songs with other political prisoners in neighbouring cells to mark the anniversary of the people’s uprising in 1988. Nine of us were punished with twenty-four inch leg irons. These are the worst of all, after one month in twenty-four inch leg irons I felt as if my hips had been dislocated. I couldn’t walk for a month after the irons were taken off.

I was arrested in 1988, sentenced to seven years in prison and released in 1994, after serving five years and seven months and twenty-four days. With full remission I could have been released after four years and eight months, but I had continued to fight for rights within the prison. For this, I was punished with leg irons three times and kept in solitary confinement for a total of three years.

But I am an activist, not a victim. I want to restore dignity, justice, freedom, equality and peace to Burma. That’s why we have being fighting for democracy; we give our lives to achieve it. So many people have already died for it.

Now it must be over. It’s not like Iowa or Ohio, Texas or Pennsylvania; this time Hillary Clinton has been well and truly defeated. She squeaked home in Indiana but got smashed in North Carolina. Mathematically she cannot win, and her narrative has been destroyed. Sadly there are no more game-changers or deciders; the time has come for her to drop out of the race.

As a Clinton supporter it hurts to say this, but people were ready for a woman president. They just didn’t want a continuation of the Clinton dynasty. Even though the 1990s were a peaceful and prosperous time, Mrs. Clinton as a figure is polarising and divisive. Moreover, Barack Obama ran a better more organised campaign; the agent of change therefore beat out the woman of experience.

But Barack Obama now has issues as well as baggage. Things have been brought out in the campaign that in the general election could wreck his chances: connections to his former pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright; associations with the unrepentant terrorist William Ayers; and unpatriotic comments made by his wife. His speech in which he described Pennsylvanians as bitter people who cling to their guns and religion will not be forgotten by the Republican machine.

Obama also has to operate with both a damaged party and the Clintons. This is not restricted to Bill and Hillary; the millions of people who went out to vote for her in the long campaign will be upset and bitter. It’s important to note that in the primaries alone, she took more votes that Obama. His task is to bring them back onside after a long, unforgiving campaign.

The unity ticket is perhaps the best solution to his problems, for it would almost be unbeatable. Barack Obama has always had great support from African-Americans (who voted for him in some states by an 85-point margin), young voters and upper-class liberals. However he has failed to convince the Reagan Democrats: downscale, white working-class men and women; the sort he alienated with the ‘bitter speech’.

Obama-Clinton would seal up that vote and help heal the party. Clinton would naturally bring that support with her, along with older voters and lower income families. Together they also have a greater chance of winning the swing states: Ohio; Florida; Pennsylvania. Without her on the ticket, her more conservative base could easily break party lines and vote for McCain.

The Democratic Party has the best chance since 1992 of taking the White House back from the Republicans. Yet somehow they always seem to hit the self-destruct button. Obama can’t risk becoming another Michael Dukasis or John Kerry. Moreover he cannot afford having his chance to make history being killed off by the Clintons and their wounded voting bloc.

John McCain must not be underestimated. He is a popular figure with broad support on the right and the left. On top of that he’ll also have the GOP machine behind him, with operatives like Karl Rove throwing dirt at Obama at every turn. It is the unity ticket therefore that has the best chance of derailing the Straight Talk Express.