SIPHOFANENI:Citizens who refuse to allow King Mswati, an absolute Monarchy, to perform withcraft inside their homes face arrest in this tiny Kingdom of eSwatini amid human rights violation with impunity.
On Monday, Mbongeni Mamba of Gilgal in the Lubombo region was detained by the Siphofaneni Police for allegedly assaulting King Mswati’s ritual men(Bemanti), the ritual men invaded Mamba’s home on Sunday seeking to perform withcraft as instructed by the King.
But King’s Spokesperson Percy Simelane when responding to this Swaziland News earlier on Sunday said, the King’s ritual men normally work in an orderly manner.
“It appears to be a police case as it involves unlawful forced entry into someone’s home and forceful movement of family members from one place to another. Our experience is that the water people go to the Indian Ocean in an orderly manner, using identifiable state vehicles.Their movement is monitored by security, and they do not have to look for army personnel when they are facing challenges along the way, to and from the Indian Ocean”, said the King’s Spokesperson.
On another note, the alleged witchcraft “is normally performed by the King and his agents who are commissioned to fetch water from the Indian Ocean and invade various home, performing rituals as part of Incwala ceremony”.
The rituals are normally performed during the end of every year and, come a few days after King Mswati hosted a National Prayer at Mandvulo Hall-Lozitha Palace.
Police Spokesperson Phindile Vilakati declined to comment about the matter.
Reached for comments on Monday afternoon, human rights lawyer Sibusiso Nhlabatsi described the matter as abuse of culture, he maintained that, it is illegal to invade people’s home to perform witchcraft.
“It’s illegal to invade people’s home and what these Bemanti do inside the homes by picking objects including soil is,in our culture, described as performing witchcraft(kutsakatsa).You cannot therefore forcefully invade someone’s home to perform witchcraft and then arrest the owner of the home if he resist your witchcraft”, said the human rights lawyer.
King Mswati(pic: Eswatini Financial Times).