Recently, the citizens of Swaziland have been publicly protesting the their King in an attempt for social and economic reform. Kind Mswati III has taken large sums of money from the country budget and has taxed citizens to the point where it is almost impossible to live a normal, healthy life. Many of the citizens of Swaziland are living in poverty off roughly two dollars a day while, the King and select government officials are receiving large paychecks (about $2,400 a month) and living a life of luxury. With the highest rate of H.I.V. infections in the world, the average income for most citizens is not enough to cover medical expenses or buy food. The economy of Swaziland is at a stand still. Statistics have said that almost five million dollars is lost from the budget each month due to corrupt activity. There have been multiple protests to bring the current problems to the spot light however, many of these protests have been met with police dressed in riot gear blocking streets as well as citizen's paths from leaving buildings. The Swazi people state they are not opposed to Monarchy because it has been a significant part of their culture but they say they are in need of a democratically elected official who will better represent the citizens. I picked this particular current event because I not only found it interesting and tied in to our class discussions, but I feel as though this current event is something more people should be aware of.
This issue is important because the income coming into Swaziland is going to King Mswati III and selected government officials instead of going toward heath care for H.I.V. patients and infrastructure within the country. A 35-year-old nurse was interviewed in this particular article and she states that she can no longer afford meat and can barely afford beans with the income she currently receives. The citizens of Swaziland are essentially starving while a select few receive generous amounts of money and because of this, there is now a full-blown fiscal crisis in Swaziland. Ultimately, if policies are not changed and money is not evenly distributed throughout Swaziland, the entire economy, as well as the government, could collapse. As we have discussed in class, the King of Swaziland has kept the state weak in an authoritarian government and in the event of an overthrow and/or a collapsed economy, Swaziland will fall into further economic turmoil which will lower the Swazi people's quality of life even farther.
Salaries in the country have become so low that teachers have left schools and refused to teach. Policy makers should to reform the laws regarding resources like food, health care, income and education so giving the citizens of Swaziland a more democratic say in the government in order to prevent a total economic collapse as well as potential wide-spread violence. Parents protested outside the Parliament building in the capital in hopes of getting raises for teachers so their children have access to education. Rev. Zwanini Shabalala joined the parents in protest and said, "This is a government that is not listening to its people. It shows that there is no democracy and no respect for people's rights as citizens of a country."
Him and the parents joined in a chant at politicians within building saying, "Why are you scared? Your time is coming."
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This is an interesting post. It seems like problems like this are widespread throughout much of Africa. In the assigned reading for tomorrow they talked a lot about how salaries are so low that people were spending more money getting to work then they were bringing in. I also found it interesting that with lowered salaries, many people stop going to work and start selling services on the street or, in the case of the military, some solider's just put up road blocks and make travelers pay them to make money. I agree that there needs to be change, especially where HIV is such a huge problem, but it seems like many leaders, even if they are elected democratically, turn to corruption. It's sad that so many protests are met with force, I hope some type of change occurs but I'm unable to see what will work.
ReplyDeleteFirst, I have to say your writing style is very clear, coherent, and eloquent as if you spoke it. Secondly, I am very interested in what you wrote. I feel that this economic corruption is widespread amongst the African continent. It is sad too because this authoritarian type corruption was a learned behavior from the original white colonists. It would be idealistic for Africa to eradicate all of the corruption rulers, and have essentially a "do-over" to recreate western democracy and capitalism so extreme taxation, famine, and other such atrocities would cease to exist.
ReplyDeleteDani-
ReplyDeleteYou do a good job of highlighting the tensions in Swaziland between the population and the government. Just be careful with formatting- the lack of spacing between paragraphs distracts from a strongly written compelling argument.