/ 11 July 2004

Swazi police break up opposition meeting

Swazi police assaulted five opposition supporters on Saturday and prevented an outlawed political party from holding a rally to celebrate the 21st anniversary of its creation.

The police set up seven roadblocks between Mbabane and Manzini, 70 kilometres east of the capital, to prevent supporters of the banned People’s United Democratic Movement (Pudemo) from meeting in the tiny mountain kingdom wedged between South Africa and Mozambique.

Pudemo Secretary General Bong’nkosi Dlamini said from his hospital bed at Mphilo Clinic in Manzini that he and other supporters were beaten with batons after refusing a police order to disperse.

”I am still to see the doctor because about five of us were brought here by other comrades and we do not know when we will be out,” he said.

A reporters said he saw five Pudemo supporters, including Dlamini, with bruises and blood-stained shirts at the hospital.

Swazi police commissioner Edgar Hillary earlier in the week said the rally was in violation of a royal act of April 12, 1973 which outlawed party politics in the kingdom.

The police order banning the rally came less than a week after Swazi King Mswati III told political parties they were no longer banned from holding meetings in the tiny mountain kingdom.

Pudemo leader Mario Masuku told about 200 supporters to go home and that the party leadership would ”re-strategise” on their next step.

Masuku said the ”king cannot be taken seriously”, in reference to Mswati’s undertaking that the political party would be allowed to hold the meeting.

But Senior Superintendent Samuel Mbhamali told Pudemo supporters: ”All we know is that the law still stands and the claims that the king said people were free to meet and discuss politics in the country is news to us.

”Leave this area otherwise you will be part of the crossfire once I unleash my forces,” Mbhamali said.

Pudemo’s youth wing late last month held a conference in neighbouring South Africa, calling for the ”total liberation” of the Swazis from ”royal supremacy”.

King Mswati, Africa’s last absolute monarch, is increasingly being criticised for his lavish lifestyle while most of his subjects live in poverty and have to grapple with Aids, food shortages and severe drought. – Sapa-AFP