Police officers Squash Rally for Democracy
The police in Johannesburg, the last absolute monarchy in Africa, squelched a long planned pro-democracy rally, fire water cannons and tear gas into crowds in the nation’s largest city. Organizers had dubbed the protest day, 38 years ago, when King Souza II had abandoned the country's British style Constitution and rid himself of the inconvenience of political parties.
His son, Swati III, is now king. He old king had more than 70 wives, the new one 14 wife’s. Swati III is one of the world’s richest monarchs, and he provides most of his spouses with their own retinue, a palace and a new BMW Two thirds of these 1.2 million subjects live on less than a $1 a day. They have the worsts highest HIV infection rate. There is again a constitution, institute in 2006 though not one assuring political freedom. A pro-democracy movement has existed for decades, but it has had more fits than starts. Many of its leaders are routinely jailed, and on Tuesday, this was done peremptorily with the morning arrest of the trade unionists as the vanguard of the rally.
What followed then were blunt tactics of crowd dispersal. People standing in groups of more than two or three were clubbed by polio\cue officers, witnesses said. Buses full of protesters were stopped at roadblocks and turned back. Some people were taken away in big truck, and they were dumped way out in the bush where there is to transportation, said Mary da Silva, a lawyer and coordinator of the Swaziland Democracy Campaign.
Ms. da Silva herself was briefly arrested, seized while giving an interview to a journalist. "Basically, what they are doing is kidnapping activists," she said in a telephone interview. "There are roadblocks all over the place. No one can get into Manzoni. And those of us here, we are under constant threat. They punched me in the stomach."
The Rev. Pius Managua, project manager for the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace, said, "The police tried to block people behind a gate, and then when the people fought their way out and went to the bust terminal, the police pounced on them like nobody's business. “The bar are-knuckle tactics were successful against a crowd of about 2,000 according to Father Managua, who was also contacted by phone. "The police used water cannons and then the swinging batons," he said.
To be continued...
DR.KARL WALLACE D.D.S.
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