Times Of Swaziland: A POLITICAL HIATUS!

A POLITICAL HIATUS!
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Nomsa Mbuli on 18/10/2024 09:22:00


THE past year has been a downward spiral in the political space in the country.
There was so much uproar over how the people want to be governed versus the set
laws in Eswatini, especially the provisions of the Constitution. It was
refreshing to see young people, back in 2021, take an interest and want to have
a say about leadership and governance.
I have worked for civil society organisations for a while and being in the
communities, one of the setbacks to development that traditional leaders always
pointed out was the disinterest of young people in politics, and as a result
they hardly ever attended community meetings. So, it was quite nice to see them
suddenly grow interest in community and national affairs.
Aggressive
The young people came in with a fierce and an almost aggressive take on the
political state of affairs. This was good; this is good any time there needs to
be a change. The aggressiveness, the drive to want to see change is what is
needed to move mountains. No country, not even one country, has ever achieved
anything worthy by simply ‘negotiating’. Of course the process starts there,
but eventually it progresses to more convincing ways of getting the will of the
people. As a result of this momentum, TROIKA had to be involved, this should be
an indication of how eye-opening these gestures were. A few months later, we hit
a brick wall. I do not know what changed but the aggression, the fierceness; the
‘we want change NOW’ attitude was taken over by a nonchalant outlook on
political and social issues.
Threatening
Besides the fact that our government can lead by threatening those who dare
demand answers, the political environment became too toxic for any positive idea
to strive. So it seems.
This brings me to my question, have we reached a political hiatus? There were so
many areas of improvement in terms of engagements, I saw and still see
opportunity for political education and awareness. When young people are hungry,
they need to be fed. They are hungry for information, hungry for change and they
desire to be used to drive that change. That is where the opportunity is. That
is exactly what our political leaders should have used to their advantage.
This is the time we could have tapped into that potential of young people and
used them to achieve the long-term dream of taking Eswatini into a first world
status. This is such a missed opportunity, but I believe not all is lost here.
There is still hope. Of course, tapping into this potential meant a large
mountain of responsibility awaits everyone of us, but especially our government.
It meant including changes to policies, laws, and all the things that the youth
was demanding into yearly budgeting.
Effort
It meant literally getting off their bums and putting in the effort. If we want
to see the country move forward in terms of politics, technology and catching up
with the rest of the world, we need to put in the work! Once the momentum gets
rolling, the only way is forward, we cannot afford breaks or setbacks. This
looming hiatus is worrying and scaring me at the same time because we need young
people as charged as they can be. My Bahai Faith background taught me that
‘The youth can move the world’ and I strongly believe that is exactly where
we have been headed since 2021. The thing with this awakening, everybody knew
all along that it had to happen eventually, but no one wanted to say it out
loud, not even the politically inclined. But this ‘hot and cold’ approach
cannot be sustained.
That is why as soon as the ball started rolling, as a country we should have
cushioned that with laws and policies, so that the move forward and the change
being called for is cemented and solid. Everything is governed by law, even in
the most democratic countries. Perhaps, it is worth our time to sit down and go
back to the drawing board. Find ways to sustainably have dialogues and emerge
victorious from all ends of the spectrum.