Peter Kenworthy

“Children’s protection, rights and development have always been close to my heart, and I look forward to doing everything I can to help us deliver on our bold but simple ambitions: that no child under five dies from preventable causes”.

In the small absolute monarchy of Swaziland, where two thirds of Swaziland’s population survives on less than a dollar a day, a lengthy drought has caused an extreme lack of water, subsequent falling crop yields and the death of thousands of cattle in the rural areas.

The meeting was to have taken place between King Mswati III, who has ruled Swaziland almost single-handedly for 30 years, and the so-called G15 group, made up of representatives from Swaziland’s civil society, trade unions and political parties SWADEPA, PUDEMO, Sibahle Sinje and the NNLC.

‘We are not masters of our political fate, but slaves of circumstance.

IN THE DEVIL’S GARDEN

Tens of thousands of Western Sahara’s indigenous population, the Saharawis, fled the advancing Moroccan army and bomber planes across the border into neighbouring Algeria.

“At the moment the king regards us as people who want to destroy the country, but once we have talked with him he will know what the people want”, says president of the People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO), Mario Masuku.

Imagine you’ve started your first job after a year’s unemployment and an endless number of job applications, after finishing your engineering degree.

Maxwell Dlamini finally walked out of prison in July, released on bail after having spent fourteen months in squalid conditions in the prisons of Swaziland’s absolute monarch King Mswati III. His crime was to have sung a pro-democracy song.

“When we got our independence from the UK in 1968 it was given to us on a silver platter. The people of Swaziland didn’t understand or have to fight for their democracy”, Linus Mavimbela tells me.

“One police officer came with a plastic bag and put it over my mouth and nose, and pressed very hard so that I couldn’t breathe. I could have died at any moment”, Bheki Dlamini says looking at the camera, close to tears.