In a last ditch effort to address growing dissent, Swaziland’s King Mswati III launched the people’s parliament yesterday, hardly impressing the throngs as weeks of protest culminate in an ongoing teachers strike and public enterprises’ workers threaten to down tools en masse this week.
The people’s parliament is a traditional system in Swaziland where people from all walks of life gather and air their views on any issue at the national cattle byre, the king’s court.
For the next three days, the monarch urged his people to make submissions on the country’s socioeconomic crises, while bearing in mind that the impact of the global economic meltdown was not over.
King Mswati is expected to chart the way forward as he addresses the nation again at the cattle byre on Thursday.
He urged the nation to come up with strategies to deal with the economic crises, particularly unemployment, which stands at 23 percent of the workforce.
As the country goes to the polls next year, he charged citizens to come up with recommendations on the best form of governance.
However, workers were visibly disappointed with the king’s speech, saying he had wasted an opportunity to deal with the impasse between the government and the Swaziland National Association of Teachers (Snat).
The union is demanding a 4.5 percent cost of living adjustment and wants the government to cancel the controversial Circular No.1, a gazetted notice that awards politicians lucrative perks.
For a month and a half, more than half of the union’s 11 000 members have been on strike while thousands of pupils who were supposed to write their mid-year examinations stood stranded.
After cutting last month’s salaries by a third for striking teachers, the government tried to fire more than 250 of them last week, but the Industrial Court ruled against it.
“We expected the king to speak specifically about the issues affecting us,” said Snat president Sibongile Mazibuko.
Innocent Ngcobo, the president of the Public Enterprises Union Co-ordinating Council, said the council stood by its resolution to petition the government this week over the cost of living adjustment.
Out of the nine parastatals that threaten to strike, three perform essential services. These are Swaziland Electricity Company, Swaziland Water Services Corporation and Swaziland Posts and Telecommunications Corporation.
In trying to reduce the wage bill, which makes up almost half of state spending, the government decided to freeze public servants’ salaries, and those of public enterprises workers.
“We’re not public servants and when we wrote to [the] government about a cost of living adjustment, we got no response,” Ngcobo said.
The Federation of Swaziland Employers and Chamber of Commerce is also worried about the industrial climate.
Chamber chief executive Zodwa Mabuza said hopefully the impasse between the government and workers would be resolved at the cattle byre.
Since 2009, the country has experienced cash flow problems following a 60 percent reduction in receipts from the Southern African Customs Union that contributes more than half of the national budget. Efforts to get a R2.4 billion loan from the South African government failed because the authorities would not meet conditions that included political reforms.
The country failed to access an annual R800 million budget support fund from the African Development Bank because the government could not meet the International Monetary Fund (IMF) recommendations, which included cutting public servants’ salaries by 5 percent and stopping all capital projects like the construction of Sikhuphe International Airport. The IMF also withdrew its staff-monitored programme in May following the government’s failure to adhere to agreed fiscal measures.
“Building this country is not the responsibility for one person but for every Swazi,” King Mswati told thousands of people gathered at Ludzidzini royal cattle byre.