RIGHTS: Snake Charming Kenyan Lawyer Tackles Govt Intrigue

By James Hall Reprint | | Print |

James Hall

MBABANE, Swaziland, Jul 11 2002 (IPS) - Intrigue is nothing new in any government, but the degree of conspiracies swirling around Swaziland’s ministry of justice has surprised local legal and media observers who say they have seen everything.

While the minister of justice Maweni Simelane lies in critical condition in a catatonic state at a South African hospital from the effects of a stroke, efforts to oust the Director of Public Prosecutions, Kenyan-born Lincoln Ng’arua, have taken centre stage.

Ng’arua feels the Attorney General, Phesheya Dlamini, is behind a conspiracy against him, and this week he filed a quarter of a million emalangeni lawsuit against him.

One U.S. dollar is equal to 10.05 emalangeni.

Meanwhile, the acting attorney general Sabelo Matsebula (who is sitting in for the attorney general) is suing his boss the justice minister for another quarter of a million emalangeni for defamation of character, claiming the minister said he was a “card carrying” member of an illegal political organisation. The minister has denied the charges.

Political parties have been banned by royal decree, and it is a career death sentence for any government official to be associated with one.

Ng’arua is also basing his case against the attorney general on a charge of defamation of character. He claims Dlamini was the real author of a letter apparently signed by the justice minister that expressed shock that the Director of Public Prosecutions did not have the proper academic credentials for his job.

“To this day, I have never received that letter, which I believe is spurious,” Ng’arua told IPS this week. One reason for the chief prosecutor’s pique is that he is eminently qualified for his post, as the review board that hired him certified.

The letter that never made it to Ng’arua found its way instead to the Swazi Observer, a daily newspaper owned by the royal conglomerate Tibiyo TakaNgwane. Not only did the newspaper run banner headlines that suggested the head prosecutor was a fraud, but its reporters also solicited comments from the prestigious Swaziland Law Society, which expressed its dismay with Ng’arua based on the news reports.

Ng’arua went to Swaziland’s only independent news organisation, the Times newspaper, and presented the facts: that he had followed his acquisition of a Diploma in Engineering from the Nairobi Polytechnic. Then a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology from Kenya’s Government College in Chandigath, and an LLB degree from KC College in Bombay, India, where he received a merit citation in criminal procedure and interpreting statutes and legal practices.

What Ng’arua also got in Bombay was a snake, a fortunate pet that has solidified his reputation amongst Swazis as no other achievement could. A photograph of a three metre-long boa constructor languidly encircling his neck and torso, while Ng’arua holds the head up for the camera, was run in a full-page colour spread the Times of Swaziland did on the prosecutor.

The newspaper could not resist the headline, “There is a Snake in this Ministry”, a reference to whomever authored the letter that questioned the chief prosecutor’s credentials.

“All that people want to talk about is the snake!” laughs Ng’arua

Snakes have significant cultural importance amongst Swazis. They figure in folklore, mythology and superstition. “By and large, Swazis are terrified of snakes, and they admire anyone with the courage to handle one,” says Agnes Mngomezulu, a biology teacher.

“When people saw Ng’arua with that snake, his reputation soared, because everyone knew he has the fortitude to take on criminals,” says another teacher, Charles Dube.

The breadth of cases handled by Ng’arua’s office this year range from the successful prosecution of a large game poaching operation that threatened Swaziland’s endangered rhinos to the controversial sedition trial of political activist Mario Masuku.

Soon, the courts will be asked to sort out the infighting and backstabbing at the justice ministry, which is in such a state King Mswati has called for a house cleaning.

Ng’arua’s flamboyant predecessor was another Kenyan, Andrika Donkoh, who laughed as he tossed journalists into jail, “I drink wine with the king!” He once purportedly brandished a pistol at his prosecutorial team. (Ng’arua says he was there, and that Donkoh merely displayed the weapon.) He finally skipped the country as a fugitive from justice after allegedly attempting to defraud the Royal Swaziland Insurance Corporation. Dankoh has denied the charges.

Ng’arua gets good marks from Swaziland’s Judicial Services Commission, whose members are appointed by King Mswati to advise him on judicial appointments. The commission is headed by the justice minister, which makes suspect his alleged critical letter to Ng’arua.

Or was it two letters? A source with the advocacy group Lawyers for Human Rights Swaziland told IPS, “From what we’ve pieced together, it is a very confusion situation. A letter was written on the day Ng’arua went to visit his brother in Kenya, and leaked to the press. It was nowhere to be seen when Ng’arua returned.”

“The deputy minister at justice said he gave the minister’s letter to the attorney general to deliver to Ng’arua. But at the time an acting attorney general was on the job, and he says he never saw the letter. He says he learned a letter from the minister was left with his private secretary, who was told to see that it was delivered,” says the source.

“But there were supposedly two letters, one for Ng’arua and another to one of his prosecutors making her acting chief prosecutor! Both disappeared,” he adds. “But the Observer got its copy, and the mudslinging campaign had achieved its objectives.”

Ng’arua, the snake charmer, has emerged from the melee with his reputation enhanced. The courts will not have to sort out any lawsuits if he receives a public apology from the attorney general, and the deteriorating health of the justice minister overtakes the defamation case against him.