THE SWAZI AIRWAYS WHITE ELEPHANT

Sir,

If media reports are to be believed that government is finally thinking of shutting down Swazi Airways, it would confirm beyond any reasonable doubt that indeed our government is either living in a different world or it is seriously sick.

Canning the project in just a year after inception is an indictment on our government. It shows that the thought processes involved prior to sanctioning this project were either defective or bordered on gross negligence on the part of government.

In a normal business institution, there would be consequences for all those involved in wasting so much money on a project that was clearly a non-starter. The poor employees who were recruited into this overzealous project will now have to go through the trauma of being retrenched. What consequences is our government going to face? In a normal and accountable government, heads would roll and the people who committed our scarce taxes to this white elephant would be fired, the public would get consolation that when public servants embark on wasteful expenditure they get axed.

But this is Swaziland, the public servants believe they are a law unto themselves and in the process they are happy to waste our meager financial resources on projects that will fail before they even start, and they carry-on as though nothing has happened. That is the price that taxpayers have to pay for having an insensitive and intransigent government. Our government does not listen, and the worst thing is that they see nothing wrong with this attitude.

When I think what the E20 million that has allegedly been wasted could have done to the starving population, I realise that our public servants are probably living in their own fantasy world of milk and honey. If they were witnessing the daily hardships that the population go through just to survive, they wouldn’t be so insensitive and arrogantly waste our meager resources despite being advised by several experts to spend prudently.

Judging by the track record of our government, this is just the tip of the iceberg, many more white elephants are going to be embarked upon and graciously fed our taxes, there is nothing to motivate government to act in a different way. It is high time that public servants are held accountable and accountability comes with consequences in the event of gross negligence. We are waiting to see if the head of government will have the guts to fire the culprits and if he is part of the problem, we expect him to do the hounourable thing and resign.

Hanger
MHLUME

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