Move to oust some REPOSA exec members

MANZINI – There is a move to oust some members of the Royal Eswatini Police Staff Association (REPOSA) executive.

These claims came forth following a meeting by the staff association on Saturday held at the Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT) Centre in Manzini.

The agenda of the meeting, according to sources, was among other things to elect an interim committee, as three members of the current executive committee were no longer partaking in meetings organised by the staff association.

The sources said the election of the interim committee was necessitated by the fact that Secretary General,

Sergeant Dumisile Khumalo was now working alone as the other members were not partaking in the meetings held by the organisation.

The sources said the junior officers had distanced themselves from the executive members of REPOSA, who visited media houses to disassociate themselves from Khumalo.

Included

These officers included the Chairperson of REPOSA Isaac ‘Kaira’ Lukhele, Deputy Chairperson Themba Gwebu and Executive Member Boy-Boy Thwala.

The trio, in the briefing of media houses, said they felt that through her actions and utterances, Khumalo was now deviating from the mandate of the association, hence the need to call her to order and set the record straight.

They highlighted that the association’s members were participating in marches, petition deliveries and meetings, without any mandate from the whole executive.

The three members of the executive further pointed out that in these ‘unauthorised’ meetings, critical decisions were taken and subsequently implemented without their (executive of the staff association) endorsement or knowledge.

Subsequent to this pronouncement by the three, the junior officers said they were not aware of them because they had not seen them in meetings. At one instance, the low ranking police officers referred to the three executive members as ‘people claiming to be part of the association’.

In light of these developments, the chairperson of REPOSA was sought for comment on the developments and he said: “I caught wind of the proposed meeting to vote for an interim committee; however, it would have been null and void.”

Meeting

Lukhele said any meeting hosted by REPOSA should be known by the chairperson and if the secretary general (SG) was convening one, he ought to be brought to speed about it. Rhetorically, Lukhele wondered what would have been the quorum of the attendees.

The SG of REPOSA could not be reached for comment as she is reportedly out of the country. She was sent a questionnaire through her WhatsApp and it was yet to be responded to when this article was compiled. Meanwhile, it is on public record that junior law enforcers have convened several meetings wherein they forged ways to coerce government to award them Phase II of the salary restructuring exercise of 2014.

One of the decisions taken was to march to Cabinet Offices and deliver a petition to the Prime Minister (PM), Cleopas Sipho Dlamini and three other ministers.

The three ministers were the Minister of Finance, Neal Rijkenberg, Minister of Public Service Mabulala Maseko and the Minister of Justice and Constitutional Affairs Pholile Shakantu.

Subsequent to this, the junior officers visited the private residence of the PM at Nhlambeni, in a quest to reemphasise their need for the implementation of Phase II. Their reasoning of the visit to Nhlambeni was that they were barred by a court order to march to the offices of the PM.