WHO KILLED MUZI MMEMA?

The country’s Mass Democratic Movement (MDM) appears to have one thing and one thing only in common - they all want multiparty democracy to be introduced in Eswatini. Apart from this, they are a house divided against itself.

In fact, they have no love lost between them. And this is no child’s play. It’s a deadly fallout. The competition for space among the political parties has become fatally dangerous. Two recent incidents have led members of some of these political parties to confirm that they are at war with each other.
 One of these incidents was the attack, by gunfire, on Sibongile Manyika, the national executive member of the Swaziland Liberation Movement (SWALIMO). Soon after the attack, SWALIMO Spokesperson Thandaza Silolo and SWALIMO President Mduduzi Simelane blamed the attack on the regime.

However, this was to be later contradicted by another SWALIMO member and exiled journalist Thabiso Moloi, who conducted a live broadcast on Swaziland Democratic News online platform, where he blamed the attack on certain individuals and groups associated with the Mass Democratic Movement. This has not been rebutted by either Silolo or Simelane. Neither has it been refuted by those accused by Moloi of being responsible for the attack. That leaves Moloi’s version as the remaining, undisputed ‘truth’.

Kidnapped

Today, in the second incident, the Mmema family of Ntondozi is scheduled to lay to rest one of their own members – Muzi – the political activist who was kidnapped from his home by unknown men who later shot him dead at a forest 20 kilometres away. This happened barely two weeks after the attack on Manyika. And it happened at a time when Mmema had just left SWALIMO to join the newly-launched breakaway Swazis First Democratic Front (SFDF). The SFDF has been formed by disgruntled former members of SWALIMO and is led by Busi Mayisela (ex-SWALIMO Chairperson), Dr Siphetfo Dlamini (ex-SWALIMO Secretary General) and Gift Dlamini (ex-SWALIMO Deputy Secretary General). Mmema, who held the position of Manzini Regional Organising Secretary while he was with SWALIMO, became the Deputy Secretary General of the SFDF.

He is no more. Who killed him? Why did they kill him? The answers to these questions are out there with someone. What is clear is that this was a politically motivated hit. Why do I say this? Just go onto social media site Facebook, look into the posts and comments between, in particular, members of SWALIMO and those of the People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO). These posts and comments will lead you into believing that indeed this was a politically motivated targeted killing.  

A report titled ‘Murder by Contract: targeted killings in eastern and southern Africa’, which has been published in September 2021 by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime (GI-TOC), defines ‘targeted killings’ as murders committed for economic, political or personal gain.
The report, which focused on three countries namely South Africa, Mozambique and Kenya, says although these killings are often outsourced to hit men, they can also be undertaken by individuals within political or organised crime groups.

The terms ‘targeted killings’, ‘hits’ and ‘assassinations’ are used interchangeably in this report. While the motive for the killing of Mmema and the attack on Manyika remain speculation, the GI-TOC report states that in the three countries studied, politically motivated hits were evident and made up a significant portion of the database when compared to organised crime hits. The politically motivated hits are said to relate to abuses of power and the elimination of competition.

Crime

Organised crime hits were also found to be present in all three countries, and this category generally relates to disputes in the illicit economy and the silencing of whistle-blowers, witnesses and activists. One doubts if Mmema’s killing was an organised crime hit. Nothing points in that direction. What could have been the reason for the political hit? What are the trends in other counties? Well, in South Africa the study by GI-TOC shows that the violence has mostly been in the KwaZulu-Natal province both during apartheid and in the transition to democracy. The violence was largely between interparty conflict between the African National Congress (ANC) and the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), and mostly linked to political ideology.

However, the trend now seems to be that violence results from intraparty conflict, particularly within the ANC, where targeted killings particularly seem to be fuelled by power struggles and competition for lucrative government tenders. When it comes to the Eswatini situation, it is not in doubt that there has been conflict among the political parties with regard to political ideology. Of late, the political parties have been hugely divided by the upcoming national elections. There are those who are in favour of participating and those who are advocating for a boycott. This has seen allies engaging in conflict.

Even the SWALIMO president, in his 2023 statement, has said ‘battle lines have been drawn by some leaders in the MDM’. The Macmillan dictionary says the phrase ‘battle line are drawn’ is used for saying that two opposing groups each have a clear and definite idea about the things they disagree about and are ready to start competing with each other.

Targeted

But, one might ask, how healthy will that competition be? As the GI-TOC study found, some might resort to eliminate competition through targeted killings. In 2016, a commission of enquiry was appointed in South Africa to look into the political violence that was taking place in the KZN province. This enquiry was known as the Moerane Commission, and it found that criminal elements were recruited by politicians to achieve political ends, resulting in a complex matrix of criminal and political associations that also led to the murder of politicians.

The report made valuable findings and it is hoped that its recommendations will lead to a long-term decrease in political violence in the province.
In Kenya, it was found that gangs are funded by political candidates, who, in turn, use violence and intimidation to help candidates get into office. A total of 133 hits were recorded in Kenya in the data collection period. Political hits made up the largest portion (63 cases; 47 per cent), followed by hits related to organised crime (57 cases; 43 per cent). Personal hits (13 cases) accounted for 10 per cent of the total.

This is a remarkably similar distribution to the South African data set (excluding taxi-related hits), with targeted killings related to political motivations and organised crime also making up a similar portion (21 per cent and 20 per cent, respectively) and personal hits accounting for the smallest percentage. In Mozambique, political hits were also found to make up the majority of cases (35; 88 per cent), with hits related to organised crime (5 cases) accounted for only 12 per cent of the incidents during this period.

Although the total number of cases was found to be too low to support definitive conclusions, the data does shed some light on the nature and location of assassinations in Mozambique. After the country’s independence from Portugal in 1975, FRELIMO and RENAMO fought a protracted civil war, which ended with a negotiated settlement in the early 1990s. However, peace has been far from sustainable since then. Following a series of RENAMO attacks on government’s sites in 2013, the government conducted an assault on the RENAMO base, where former leader Afonso Dhlakama was located.

The attack led the opposition leader to announce the end of the peace agreement. The political-military conflicts that erupted in the aftermath of the Rome Peace Agreement had a detrimental effect on Mozambique’s economy and security. An atmosphere of fear and instability affected tourism and investors that were willing to put money in the region withdrew, which led to millions of Mozambicans demonstrating in the streets of Maputo against the violence and the surge of kidnappings that occurred in that period.

Conflict

The conflict escalated after FRELIMO’s victory in the October 2014 elections. The two main political parties in Mozambique could not reach an agreement, as RENAMO rejected FRELIMO’s victory under allegations of fraud and demanded to govern six provinces where it claims to have been victorious. During this period, assassinations seemed to become routine in Mozambique: from October 2014 to 2018, numerous assassinations or attempted assassinations occurred, pertinently illustrated by the assassination of a prominent RENAMO politician, José Almeida Murevete.

From these findings by the GI-TOC, it is clear that competition among political organisations leads to violence. And there is currently a lot of such competition in Eswatini at the moment. There is, also, emerging violence that is being witnessed. Those responsible for the violence are known by some members of the political organisations as evidenced by what they have been posting on facebook.

Without mentioning names, let me quote what one prominent member of another political organisation wrote on facebook regarding the death of Mmema: “Siyanati babulali ba Muzi nabo bayatati abalali bayachucha futsi … nawuyimpimbi yemaphoyisa ubowati kutsi ayacoca watch the space the net is closing for these bogus comrades (we know the killers of Muzi and they also know themselves, they’re even having sleepless nights and panicking…if you are a police informant you should know that they do talk, watch this space the net is closing for these bogus comrades).”
Let me leave it right here…for now.   

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