/MAY DAY/LABOUR-SWAZILAND: Teachers at Forefront of Pro-Democracy Movement

By James Hall Reprint | | Print |

James Hall

MBABANE, Apr 29 2002 (IPS) - The Swaziland National Association of Teachers is at the forefront of the pro-democracy movement in a kingdom that is ruled by sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch.

“There has always been a desire by teachers for accountable and democratic government, and of all the unions the teachers union has been the most militant in the country. This is one reason King Sobhuza banned labour unions along with opposition political parties in 1973,” says Jason Simelane, a primary school teacher in the capital Mbabane.

After nearly 30 years, the palace still bans political parties, to the growing distress of the outside world. But as a United Nations member obliged to subscribe to the UN Charter and as a signatory to various human rights accords, Swaziland has had to permit workers to organise once more.

“The royal government would prefer to have teachers welfare addressed by the ministry of education only,” says Phineas Magagula, president of the teachers union. “But no employer can adequately see to the needs and ambitions of its employees. That is why unions are needed, especially for government-employed workers.”

“Our agenda is greater than bread and butter issues because Swaziland is an unusual country that is not a democracy,” says Musa Dlamini, the union’s secretary general. “We belong to the Swaziland Democratic Alliance. We are at the forefront of a movement to return government power to the masses, as it was before the 1973 constitutional coup where the king assumed ultimate powers.”

Jan Sithole, secretary general of the Swaziland Federation of Trade Unions, which is also a democratic alliance member, says, “Workers issues cannot be divorced from political issues, especially in Swaziland”.

“When interest rates and inflation go up because government is spending on status-oriented white elephant projects it cannot afford, workers welfare suffers,” he says. “When public services are inefficient because government offices are staffed through nepotism, and no official can be held accountable because he is appointed by the palace and not elected by the people, the unions must push for reform.”

At 80,000 members belonging to affiliated unions, the workers federation is the largest organised opposition group to the rule of the royal Dlamini family, headed by King Mswati and a band of elders primarily comprised of his brothers.

Critics of royal rule, who are not Swazi by birth, have customarily been deported, and royalists have depicted Sithole as a foreigner because his father is a Mozambican, although his mother is Swazi and he was born and raised in Swaziland.

Efforts to deport Sithole would prove costly, however, because as ipso facto head of the opposition, he is respected internationally and has the support of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) in Geneva.

On three occasions when palace-drafted legislation has infringed on workers or human rights or attempted to diminish labour unions, the ILO has called for economic sanctions to be imposed on the kingdom. Each time the threat was raised, the palace revised the offensive laws.

The teachers union also has been a thorn in the side of royal rule, insisting that King Mswati’s status change from absolute to constitutional monarch under a democratic system.

Political observer Vusi Ginindza feels that while King Mswati might have no problem with this arrangement, “the king’s princely brothers and royal parasites who depend on patronage to keep posts for which they are unqualified are fighting tooth and nail to resist reform”.

“There seems a natural inclination amongst teachers toward democracy and its values, which elevate individualism and intellectual pursuit, and which in turn means questioning authority, and this is fundamentally at odds with a rigid monarchial system. It is hard to achieve academic freedom in a politically oppressive society,” says Cynthia Mngomezulu, a science teacher.

Political meetings and rallies are banned under the royal decree that abolished opposition parties, but labour unions are permitted to hold membership meetings.

Late last year a teachers union meeting was broken up by well-armed security forces, which routinely surround the headquarters of the Swaziland National Association of Teachers during general meetings. Police authorities determined the assembly was being used by anti-government speakers to make protest speeches.

“The meeting was hijacked by non-union members who were speaking politics,” Prime Minister Sibusiso Dlamini reported to parliament.

Responds Magagula, “They were teachers, and the union has no right to infringe on their rights to express their political views.”

Teachers union is also protesting against the palace’s intention to institute a new constitution that will make the royal family the permanent and uncontested rulers of Swaziland. A constitutional report composed by King Mswati’s brother, Prince Mangaliso, was burned at one planning meeting this week, a hint of things to come.

The security forces are also ready. Magagula recalls that in 1997 at the climax of the longest strike in Swaziland history, in which teachers sought a pay raise, a march to the national airport to meet King Mswati on his return from overseas was violently broken up by the army.

“I never saw such brutality in the country as when police were firing rubber bullets and tear gas and beating the peaceful demonstrators,” recalls Magagula.

But the union’s central role in the democratic alliance, and its stepped up rhetoric preceding May Day observations Wednesday, show that teachers have not been intimidated.