‘Swazi claim on SA land is valid’
Swaziland unlikely to succeed: analyst
MORE than a million KwaZulu-Natalians could become subjects of King Mswati III under a bold new move by the Swazi government to reclaim vast areas of land taken away during British rule.
Swaziland’s rejuvenated Border Adjustment Committee has revealed that it intends reporting South Africa to the UN for failing to negotiate a solution to the land issue, a bone of contention between the country and the South African government for more than a century.
If the Swazi monarch has his way, Swaziland’s borders will open on three fronts, spreading eastwards past the rolling hills of Ngavuma in northern KZN to the border of Mozambique, and then south to Lake Sibaya, unlocking the tiny nation to the Indian Ocean.
Northwards, Swaziland wants parts of Mpumalanga, including Barberton and a section of the Kruger National Park.
“They have a valid argument for the land but I just don’t see them ever being successful for it,” said Philip Bonner, a professor of history at Wits University.
“There is no solution in sight. I can’t see the Swazi government giving up on the ideal of the land and neither can I see the South African government ever giving up the land,” he said.
The Swazi government claims much of their land was arbitrarily carved up in the 19th century by British colonialists who gave the eastern part of the land to the Natal colony and other parts to the Boer Republic.
This, they argue, has created a situation where more Swazi speakers live outside Swazliand than in the country.
Reunited
From the time of his coronation in 1921, King Sobhuza, Mswati’s father, has sought to re-unify his country.
When he died in 1982, his son took up the land issue and in recent times has said it was his desire, too, for all Swazis to be reunited.
Bonner said that in the 1860s, the land around Swaziland was given to two white farmers.
“But on the ground the picture was very different. The Swazi people still lived on the land. De jure [by law], they had no right to the land, but de facto they were there,” he said.
“In places such as Barberton in the Free State and Carolina in Mpumalanga, they had royal villages and most the people there still speak Swazi.”
Bonner believes that the new move to reclaim the disputed land is from the Swazi chiefs who feel the land is rightfully theirs.
“But it is not something that will go down well with the people because many would not want to become Swazi citizens, because they are benefiting from South Africa’s social grants and pensions,” he said.
“Also, I don’t think they will have too much success at the UN, because African states are very hostile about changing borders. Who else will they get support from?”
A retired historian from the University of Zululand, Professor Jabulani Maphalala, agreed.
“In March 1967 the then Organisation of African Unity decided through the Lusaka Manifesto that all those borders that were arbitrarily drawn by the colonialist must remain,” he said.
“The Swaziland issue is not unique and it plays itself in every African country. There are tribes that live outside the borders that their ancestors came from. Even here in South Africa you have Xhosa people living within the boundaries of the KZN,” he said.
Maphalala said that if Swaziland ever succeeded, the precedent it created would “throw the whole African continent into chaos”.
South Africa’s International Relations spokesman, Clayson Monela, said: “South Africa would engage with Swaziland on all of these matters.”