King Mswati III of Swaziland has received a luxury jet as a gift from 'anonymous sponsors', a government spokesperson has confirmed to the BBC. The DC-9 twin-engine aircraft is for the use of the king and his 13 wives, Percy Simelane said. Swazi's banned opposition party says taxpayer money must have been used to buy it, but Mr Simelane denies this.

With Swaziland's economy crumbling due to falling revenues and the King's refusal to curtail his lavish lifestyle, a pro-democracy movement has been gaining steam. On April 13, political exiles from Swaziland and their supporters from South Africa and other African nations rallied outside the Swaziland Consulate in Johannesburg. Representatives from more than 20 organizations were on hand.

Teachers in Swaziland defied a government ban on their meeting and called a two-day strike. More than 300 members of the Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT) met in Manzini where they decided to strike on 9 and 10 May 2012, to demand a 4.5 per cent salary increase.

Democracy campaigners in Swaziland have come up with a novel protest against King Mswati III - ignore the public holiday called to mark his birthday and go to work instead. The April 12 Swazi Uprising Movement is one of the many groups and individuals in Swaziland angered that King Mswati will be spending millions of emalangeni of public money on his birthday party. They want the Swazi people to boycott any celebration of his 44th birthday that falls on Thursday (19 April 2012).

Swazi riot police detained at least seven activists Saturday on their way to a pro-democracy church service in the central city of Manzini, one of the activists said. Wandile Dludlu from the Swaziland United Democratic Front (SUDF) and head of the banned Pudemo opposition Mario Masuku were among those held, Dludlu told AFP.

The Times of Swaziland censored itself when it reported Wikileaks was asking people in the kingdom to leak documents to its website. The Times, the only independent daily newspaper in Swaziland, reported 26 March that Wikileaks asked people to send it documents relating to the People’s United Democratic Movement (PUDEMO), a banned organisation in Swaziland where King Mwsati III rules as sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch. But, what it did not report was that Wikileaks had a higher priority from Swaziland than PUDEMO on its wanted-information list: ‘Expense accounts of King Mswati, the Queen Mother and the King's wives.’

Swaziland is planning a censorship law that will ban Facebook and Twitter users from criticising its autocratic ruler, King Mswati III. Africa's last absolute monarch is facing growing protests over his undemocratic regime which has pushed the tiny mountain kingdom to the brink of bankruptcy. But Mswati's justice minister, Mgwagwa Gamedze, told the Swazi senate: 'We will be tough on those who write bad things about the king on Twitter and Facebook. We want to set an example.'

Health-e news reports on Musa Ernest Nkoko, a 52-year old ex-miner with multi-drug resistant (MDR) tuberculosis. He lives in KaShoba in the Lubombo region of Swaziland with his wife and five children aged between 9 and 27 years. Co-infected with HIV, Nkoko says he has been on treatment for MDR-TB for the last four years. The disease has diminished Nkoko’s lung capacity and rendered him too weak to do any work, and he and his family relies on his wife’s income as a part time cleaner.

All public service unions in Swaziland are threatening strike action for a 4.5 per cent pay increase. This comes at a time when the Swazi Government is trying to reduce its public sector salary bill by 10 per cent to try to save the kingdom’s economy from meltdown.

According to a report by the UN Country Team in Swaziland, released on 16 March, a fiscal crisis which started early in 2011 has put an additional strain on poor households like Thwala’s and worsened poverty in a country which already had high rates of unemployment and food insecurity and the highest HIV rate in the world. The report, based on a November 2011 survey of 1,334 households, found that poor households have had to adopt extreme measures to cope with reduced incomes resulting from job losses and wage cuts, as well as higher food and fuel prices and reduced access to social services.

Students in Swaziland will have their scholarships revoked if they engage in political activity, if the Swazi Government has its way. New rules for students presently being drafted state that ‘at its discretion’, the Scholarship Selection Board can terminate a scholarship ‘when a student is a member, supports or furthers the activities of a banned entity’. In Swaziland all political parties are banned, as are a number of pro-democracy organisations, including the Swaziland Youth Congress (SWAYOCO) and the Swaziland Solidarity Network.

The Trade Union Congress of Swaziland (TUCOSWA) will be officially launched 10 - 13 March 2012. The new group is expected to discuss how to step up its campaign for democracy in the kingdom ruled by King Mswati III, sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch. Major protests are expected in April and May this year. TUCOSWA, which will have about 50,000 members, is an amalgamation of the existing Swaziland Federation of Trade Unions (SFTU) and Swaziland Federation of Labour (SFL). It is hoped that the new group will enable trade unionists in Swaziland to speak with a single voice.

The Law Society of SA has written to the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) raising a concern about South African judges serving on the bench in Swaziland, saying that the Swazi judiciary appeared to be compromising the rule of law. There is a long tradition of southern African judges, especially when retired, serving on the benches of each other’s courts, However, the Swazi judiciary has come in for increasing criticism over the past couple of years, reaching crisis point last year when Judge Thomas Masuku was fired by King Mswati on what were believed to be trumped-up charges.

South Africa is sneaking E2.4 billion (US$320 million) to Swaziland to help it shore up its ailing economy so that the undemocratic kingdom does not have to instigate political reforms, a Swazi campaigning group claimed. The Swaziland Coalition of Concerned Civic Organisations (SCCCO) says the loan money is being channelled into Swaziland disguised as cash from the Southern African Customs Union (SACU). This way Swaziland gets the money without reforms by King Mswati.

The Botswana Government has snubbed Swaziland’s People’s United Democratic (Pudemo) calls for Swazi MPs to be barred from participating in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Parliamentary Forum and Pan-African Parliament. Pudemo, Swaziland’s largest opposition, has heightened its campaign against King Mswati III’s reign. The socialist party has been pushing for political and economic reform in Africa’s last standing monarchy. But Botswana’s minister of Foreign Affairs Phandu Skelemani said the government would not interfere with Swaziland’s sovereignty.

Over the past few years, a number of allegations of alleged brutality and the excessive use of force by the Swaziland Police have been made. In the Siteki area, these allegations have recently led to public protests and strikes. It has been reported that four residents of the area have died at the hands of the police. This piece documents testimony from witnesses, friends and family members of the four people who were killed.

The International Monetary Fund has warned that Swaziland's fiscal crisis has reached a critical point and there is a high risk that the kingdom will be unable to pay its civil servants' wages for the next few months. The report also says that Swaziland's gross domestic product (GDP) will contract by 2 per cent during 2012 and, if the country does not change its 'unsustainable' fiscal policy, its debt-to-GDP ratio could reach more than 80 per cent by 2016.

Swaziland’s Prime Minister Barnabas Dlamini who was at the centre of controversy last year (2011) when it was revealed he bought Swazi nation land for himself at a price massively below its true value, has a personal fortune of E12 million (US$1.56 million) it has been revealed. Among his assets are E392,000 worth of shares in Swazi Empowerment (Pty) Limited (SEL), a company that in turn has a 19 per cent shareholding with MTN Swaziland, the monopoly mobile phone operator in the kingdom. Details of Dlamini’s fortune are contained in a statement of assets and liabilities that was submitted by the Prime Minister to the Swazi Integrity Commission last week, leaked to the Times of Swaziland, the kingdom’s only independent daily newspaper, reports Swazi Media Commentary.

A woman protester was shot at close range by Swazi police as she was walking from them. Local media report that it is not known if she was hit by live ammunition or a rubber bullet. Rose Fakudze was part of a protest march in Siteki, Swaziland, called by vendors and transport operators over plans by the town hall to move the local bus rank. Fakudze was shot from a distance of less than two metres which badly injured her hand. The shot finger bled profusely and she did not receive any first aid until she collapsed.

The R7 billion (US$879 million) Southern African Customs Union (Sacu) payout to Swaziland for the 2012-13 financial year could keep King Mswati III's tottering government afloat for much of this year. Prime Minister Sibusiso Dlamini has been tight lipped on what the Sacu windfall will be used for. Southern Africa Report says there is 'good reason to suppose that Mswati will squander much of it on resuscitating his large vanity construction projects, among them a second international airport and royal technology park, as well as private investment schemes to boost his already bloated state earnings.'