By Zweli Martin Dlamini

The press statement released by Cabinet through its Secretary Victor Nxumalo where Government stated that the security of information will be strengthened to avoid any further leaks suggests that Ministers are far from reality and living in their own world of imagination.

It is very disturbing that Mswati’s Cabinet, instead of addressing the grievances raised by the people, thinks strengthening the security of information is the solution.

Well without disclosing how we, investigators source information, let me challenge all these Ministers to analyse how a camera looks like, they must then analyse the eyes of a human being.

In short, even if they can attend meetings without gadgets, their own eyes are our cameras and some of them will tell us what was happening in those secret meetings.

Even without any gadget, a human being has the ability to collect evidence and store it in the mind before passing it to investigators. 

It is for that reason a witness can stand in court and present testimonial evidence because that person managed to record what happened through his or her eyes, stored it in the mind and then present it in court.

The evidence of an eyewitness is also known as direct evidence or prima facie evidence, in this regard, even if gadgets could be banned in those meetings, any Cabinet Minister can record the proceedings using the eyes and the mind and then come out and tell us what was discussed there.

Such evidence assists us to conduct further investigation and support the   evidence presented by our sources.

With this lecture, I am bringing to the attention of Cabinet that investigative journalists know how to get information and sources play a key role in promoting the Constitutional right to information.

Cabinet would be wasting taxpayers money trying to strengthen the security of information, we are now living in a world where information flows smoothly.

I once told someone that a mere car registration number plate is linked to your Identity Document(ID), with that ID with investigate your bank accounts, travel history and we can even know your health condition through your medical aid transaction  and the Pharmacies you buy medication.

Then elderly people in Cabinet think they can invest in hiding information, they cannot do that to trained investigators, we can even get any personal information about a Cabinet Minister if we want.

With the above, I am just enlightening Cabinet not to waste taxpayers money trying to strengthen the security of information, maybe they can do that to journalists of the State controlled media who don't investigate but rely on press statements for stories.

We expect government to subscribe to the principles of transparency and accountability, what’s the significance of hiding information from the public who are funding their salaries through taxes?

Actually, that press statement suggesting that Cabinet Ministers were joking in their WhatsApp group by plotting to shut down the internet is an outright lie, that was an official communication.

Pro-democracy Members of Parliament(MPs) Bacede Mabuza and Mthandeni were arrested and the police retrieved their private communication where were they talking about the protests.

The State wants to present those messages as evidence in court and they further leaked it to the State controlled media just to embarrass them.

Then if what we discuss in our WhatsApp groups is a joke, why are police always longing to grab our cellphones for investigation, do they want to read jokes and laugh?

In light of the aforementioned, it evident that this Cabinet never stops undermining the intelligence of the citizens, they think we don’t have the ability to think and analyse things.

Mswati’s Government plot things against the people behind the scenes and then use the captured media to lie through press statements.

But the time for propaganda is over and we will make sure we expose all secret dealings of this illegitimate Cabinet.