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GOVT STOPS SOCIAL WORKER’S SECRET USA TRIP

19/02/2023 08:00:00 Welcome Dlamini

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MBABANE – A senior government official, who holds the rank of undersecretary, is part of a trio being investigated for playing a role in arranging an unauthorised trip to the United States.

The undersecretary, who is under investigation is in another ministry and is said to have forged the signature of the undersecretary in the DPM’s Office. The trip, which was scheduled for yesterday (February 18, 2023) was to be undertaken by a social worker employed under the Deputy Prime Minister’s Office, which houses the country’s Social Welfare Department.

Investigations by the Times SUNDAY have revealed that the undersecretary (name withheld) is alleged to have forged the signature of the undersecretary in the DPM’s Office when writing a memo to the Ministry of Home Affairs confirming that the social worker had been officially assigned to embark on the overseas trip. The memo is said to have accompanied an application by the social worker to be granted an international passport. A woman from the United Sates, who is in Eswatini on a visitor’s visa, has also been found to be involved in the planned travel.

All three people were planning to take an unidentified minor child to the United States, where they claim the toddler is to undergo a skin grafting surgery. They reportedly claim that a US-based entertainment industry non-profit organisation known as The Stars Foundation, which advocates for underprivileged children and youth of the world, is going to fund the child’s surgery. Deputy Prime Minister Themba Masuku is one of the organisation’s patrons, however, he did not know about this trip and neither did the entire Deputy Prime Minister’s Office.

Involvement in the trip

This publication managed to get hold of the organisation, which is based in Nashville, Tennessee, and it distanced itself from any involvement in the trip. “No, we at The Stars Foundation are not involved with the situation with the child as outlined in your email,” said Pastor Roger J. Piggott, who is one of the organisation’s executives. The 2022 Trafficking in Persons Report by the US Department of State downgraded Eswatini to Tier 2 Watch List because of, among other factors, not fully meeting the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking even though significant efforts are being made to do so.

Corruption and official complicity in trafficking crimes are being cited as having remained significant concerns.
A court order has reportedly already been issued by the Mbabane Magistrates Court instructing the DPM’s Office to facilitate the trip. However, it has been ascertained that the DPM’s Office has instructed its legal advisor to engage the attorney general’s Office to challenge the court order because there are questions on the information used to obtain it.

Principal Secretary (PS) in the DPM’s Office Melusi Masuku said they had learnt that guardianship had been granted to the USA woman yet she was in the country on a visitor’s visa, and had not established permanent residency in Eswatini. “How was this person granted the guardianship? That’s where the matter is at now,” the PS said.

Control over the child

The Children’s Protection and Welfare Act describes a guardian as ‘any person who, in the opinion of the Children’s Court having cognisance of any case in relation to the child or in which the child is concerned, is for a time being in charge of or has control over the child’. the Act also states that ‘the Children’s Court may appoint a guardian on the application made by any person, where the child’s parents are no longer living, or cannot be found and the child has no guardian and there is no other person having parental responsibility for him or where the parents of the child are no longer living together’.

The secret trip was exposed after an official in the Ministry of Home Affairs (immigration department) received an application for the processing of an international passport for the social worker. The application, it has been established, purported that the social worker held the position of Principal Social Worker. It is said that the home affairs official, knowing the identity of the incumbent principal social worker, called him to ask if he had been moved from his position, only to find that he still held the post. The PS, who confirmed the botched secret trip, said the home affairs official then alerted the principal social worker of the application for a service passport that had been brought in, purportedly from the DPM’s Office.

Falsified title

“A social worker made the application under a falsified title of Principal Social Worker. On top of that, they forged the signature of the undersecretary. In the memo they stated that the trip is to Tennessee on the invite of Stars Foundation, of which the DPM is a patron. We didn’t know about such an invite until we were contacted by home affairs,” the PS said. He said when the principal social worker was alerted about this, he then contacted the director of Social Welfare who in turn contacted the US who also knew nothing about the matter.

“The US then contacted me. We were surprised that a person can issue such an instrument as if it was from the ministry and written on behalf of the PS and even sign ‘for the PS’ without having received the authority to do so. Later on, we discovered that this was a trip being organised under the carpet,” said the PS. He said they got to learn that the under-investigation undersecretary, the woman from the USA and the social worker had agreed to take a child from the Mbabane Government Hospital, who suffered burn wounds, to go and undergo a surgery at a hospital in Boston, USA.

“All this was done without the knowledge of the DPM’s Office. I then told the Social Welfare director to summon the social worker and speak to her about the matter. The social worker, when engaged, said she knew nothing about any memo and distanced herself from anything that has to do with the trip,” te PS said. By this time, the PS said he had already reported the matter to the police because he felt such an act should not be tolerated.

Forged signatures

“The law has to take its course because it might happen that there may be previous instances we are not aware of where letters with forged signatures were used. If we don’t address it now, this might continue even in future, hence we involved the police from the fraud department who are now investigating the matter,” he said. He said when the social worker denied her involvement; they then got hold of the USA woman and asked her to come to the DPM’s Office in the presence of the social worker.

The PS further said he wanted to ascertain what the trip was about because issues of children, especially of this nature, where it involved travelling to another country, had to involve the DPM’s Office, the Ministry of Health and the Human Trafficking Department under Prime Minister’s Office. He said on top of that, there should be a court application for an order granting them permission for the trip. “I wanted the lady to come with the social worker because we didn’t even have a report on whether any assessment was done on the child and whether the child’s parents were aware that their child was being taken to the US,” he said.

Trip was all about

The USA woman is said to have indeed come and tried to explain what the trip was all about, in the presence of the social worker, but was told that everything had been mishandled from the onset as procedures and protocol were not followed. “I then told the social worker that she was not truthful regarding the letter in which she said she had been invited by Stars Foundation in Tennessee and on the other hand, said that she was going to Boston, where she was taking a child for surgery. We asked her about this information.

"Secondly, I asked her if she had alerted her immediate supervisor (in this case the principal social worker) about the trip and that she was working on this case and we found that she only notified the supervisor three/four days before we got to know about the trip. That on its own shows that this was a trip being undertaken secretly. They didn’t want us to know about it,” stated the PS.

The social worker has reportedly since been removed from the case and the Social Welfare director is said to have assigned another officer to work on the matter. When the PS was asked if there was any financial gain that was to be accrued by the officer and undersecretary from the trip, he said he would not know what these individuals stood to benefit.

Promised heaven

“But you may find that they had been promised heaven and earth. I wouldn’t know. What we suspect is that they were looking for greener pastures by having the social worker going to the USA and not coming back to Eswatini. We suspect this because these days we gather that she is talking about resigning. You can tell that she was really eager to go on the trip and not come back,” he said. The PS said he was now expecting the Social Welfare director to come with all the paperwork regarding the trip. “I now expect the director of Social welfare to come to me with all the paperwork regarding this trip on what they have done,” he said.

Adding, the PS said they had not engaged the undersecretary who has been implicated in the botched trip, but had left everything in the hands of the police, who will decide on the individuals to engage. The DPM also confirmed knowledge of the matter and said it was brought to his attention by the PS. “This matter is very disturbing. To forge a signature; that’s fraud! I was surprised when the PS told me what had happened because I, ordinarily, should know about every external travel that has to be undertaken by officers. But in this case I knew nothing,” he said.

Masuku said what was worse was that the name of an organisation in which he is a patron had been cited, yet he was in the dark. “But I will allow all due processes to take their course so that we get to the bottom of this. The PS is the one who has all the details of this matter,” he said.

Adopt a child

Meanwhile, the Children’s Protection and Welfare Act stipulates how a non-citizen can adopt a child who is liSwati.
In Section 65(1)(a)(b)(c)(d)and(e), the Act states that a person who is not a citizen of Swaziland (Eswatini) may adopt a Swazi child, if he has stayed in Swaziland for at least one year; has fostered a child for at least one year under the supervision of a social worker; does not have a criminal record; has a report concerning his suitability to adopt a child from his country’s social welfare office or other competent national authority; and has satisfied the High Court that his country of origin will respect and recognise the adoption order and will grant resident status to the child.