By Bongiwe Dlamini

Every June on this day,for the past three years,the repressive Tinkhundla Royal Supremacist Regime enters a state of elevated chariness. 

Today marks the 3rd anniversary of the 2021 June 29 eSwatini massacre, an event the regime is determined to erase from the collective memory of the people of our country and the world. 

The past week,throughout the country,armed bodied men have raided,arrested,and staged roadblocks in an effort to intimidate the citizenry. 

The visibility of these security forces has been so intense that many brave Swazis have taken to their social media accounts to complain about the inconvenience and effrontery experienced at the hands of these mercenaries.

As we commemorate this important day, it is important that we explain exactly what it resembles and signify in the struggle for our emancipation. Failure to do so will lead to future generation mischaracterizing June 29. 

All progressive patriots must spare no effort nor energy in ensuring that our right to openly and publicly commemorate the iconic sacrifices of our patriots, including affording them a befitting honor is preserved. This universal symbol of collective resistance against the oppressive power of the state must never be eradicated by the regime that massacred them in the first place.

For Mswati and his repressive regime, concealing the events of the June 29 massacre and the extra-judicial killings that followed that fateful month is paramount. 

The excessive violence unleashed on the day not only annihilated the demonstrators but also sent a strong message to future generations. 

It is precisely for this reason, acknowledged together with the executions of Cde Nhlanhla Kunene, Cde Thulani Rudolf Maseko, Cde Muzi Mmema, Cde Mlandvo Khumalo, just to name but a few; the persecutions of Cde Mduduzi Bacede Mabuza together with Mthandeni Dube; and the inhumane treatment meted on all political detainees that June 29 must be understood.

June 29 was a great leap forward in our “Road To Justice” as immortally affirmed by the martyred Cde Thulani Maseko. The Swazi people having been waging struggles against the injustices visited on our shores by settler colonialism and later royal supremacy, which stripped us of our rights to land, mineral resources, wildlife enjoyment, economic and political liberties and our dignity. Tinkhundla has served to Impose, Reinforce and Reproduce this idea that we

as native Swazis are inferior and undeserving of any meaningful rights to sovereignty over our own affairs. 

Two anchors of social fabric that settler colonialism and tinkhundla royal supremacy purposefully destroyed were rural livelihoods and social life of native Swazi families. It was this deliberate social stratification of our people that persist to date. 

Agency, Autonomy and Supremacy of the native people was eroded.This is what we must correct.

As we commemorate this day-The Day of Martyrs! I am making a perfervid appeal to all freedom fighters in our country that our revolution must change and gain new perspectives. 

We must be on the offensive! One of the valuable lessons I learnt from the martyrs of this day is that one doesn’t have to see the whole staircase to take the first step. We may have come on different ships, but we are in the same boat now. 

We are either dead,in jail, unemployed,underpaid,living in abject poverty, in exile or hunted by this murderous regime. 

So, we must fight with every ounce of energy in our bodies and embrace the reality that every revolution creates its own martyrs and equally so, it also produces its own traitors. We can’t be discouraged by the treacherous actions of the few. This is the year of the REVOLUTION!

It is my sincere belief that even those that may have thought that participating in the ritual gimmick of nothingness called Tinkhundla elections would help change things have realized that it was an error of judgement. History has long shown that appeasement does not satisfy a voracious beast.

I urge all my fellow countrymen, in memory of the all the martyrs who perished before, during, and after June 29; in salutations to the sacrifices made by Bacede, Thabo Kunene, and all those who continue to languish in Mswati’s prisons; and in exalting Cde Thulani Maseko together with those who made the ultimate sacrifices, let us not submit but fight to the end. Let us be determined never to bequeath to our kids our coward ways of fighting a murderous regime. May the endearing qualities of President John June Nquku, President Ambrose Phesheya Zwane, President Mario Thembeka Masuku, and President Jan Jabulani Sithole manifest in you.

I am making a clarion call to all young people to embrace the bravery of Amos Mbedzi, Musa Dlamini, Jack Govender, Ntokozo Ngozo, and Mlandvo Khumalo, stand up and fight for motherland.

Draw inspirations in Honorable Bacede’s statement from the dock when he declared to the court and the world that “I am prepared to stand for the truth, whatever might come.”

Please be strengthened by the immortal words of Nelson Mandela in 1962, uttered at the Old Synagogue in Pretoria on the occasion of his mitigation of sentence for allegedly inciting workers to strike:

”To men,freedom in their own land is the pinnacle of their ambitions, from which nothing can turn men of conviction aside.”

Long live the Spirit of June 29, Long live

Freedom in our lifetime.