Swaziland: Will social services continue?

Swaziland’s parliamentarians are questioning the purpose of a social safety net covering children, the elderly and the disabled. One dismissed it as little more than a public relations exercise, but in the teetering economy the recipients often depend on these small grants and pensions for survival. Donor-dependent Swaziland has been plunged into a financial crisis since receipts from the Southern Africa Customs Union dried up in the wake of the global 2008 slowdown, but finance minister Majozi Sithole recently conceded that government corruption cost the country nearly twice the annual amount budgeted for social services.