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SCU SAGA LIKE THE SWORD OF DAMOCLES HANGING OVER SD

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THE royal command from the sovereign His Majesty King Mswati III resolving the controversy over the shutdown of the Swaziland Christian University in Mbabane was welcomed with an audible sigh of relief from across the nation albeit in the long haul it might just turn out to be like the Sword of Damocles.


What matters is not the problem but how it is resolved hence the Sword of Damocles narrative.
In this specific case its immediate impact is to make certain institutions dysfunctional for fear of treading where the angels fear. Consequently, this ends up creating more problems than resolving one as the case of the SCU might well prove in the long term.
Ironically the government cannot be exonerated from culpability for the mess culminating in the closure of the SCU. While not being judgmental on the capacity of the SCU to fulfill its mandate as a tertiary institution to the Swazi child, it is government’s impotence and inaction that over the years sprouted so-called tertiary institutions every square metre of Swazi soil that were largely owned by foreigners from across the continent.


It was open season with no one to reign them in.
A majority of these money-spinning ventures parading as tertiary institutions sprouted at a time when Swazis were timid to venture into such areas of business ostensibly because they were not business-savvy coupled to the ignorance driven belief that private persons and institutions could not own and operate institutions of learning, more especially tertiary institutions. This belief was evidently informed by a lack of exposure to what was happening elsewhere outside the borders of the Kingdom of Eswatini.


For decades government did nothing to control and regulate these largely foreign-owned pseudo tertiary institutions that were ripping off Swazi students in exchange for qualifications that could not assure them jobs anywhere. It is only yesterday that government seemingly woke up from her slumber and thereupon established the Swaziland Higher Education Council (SHEC) that is now responsible for overseeing and regulating tertiary institutions and whose mandate has since been compromised.


It is ironic that in the middle of often violent protests by students over the closure of SCU, government sought to pass the buck by claiming that it was not responsible for shutting down the institution.


This was akin to disowning SHEC, its very creation like parents disowning their offspring. Instead of abdicating its responsibilities government ought to have preoccupied itself with providing solutions to the problem. But then again, owing to the crude architecture of the obtaining political hegemony, government is not primarily serving people but only its benefactor hence it recoiled to its natural habitat of unleashing its only tool, the hammer, because it tends to see every problem involving the people as a nail.
On the sidelines government appointed a task team, or whatever you want to call it, to investigate – a time wasting exercise for which this government has become accomplished – to appear to be doing something.


Accumulatively this, and a very long list of other problems and challenges facing this nation - they include the question over the decriminalisation of cannabis, influx of alien nationals into the country, widespread unemployment of the youth, poverty alleviation/interventions, chronic problem of food security, reckless management of the fiscus etc., would have unravelled the government and, if it were accountable to the people as in under a multiparty democracy, would have long been sent packing.
As I see it, while not attempting to debate the pros and cons of the issues central to the closure of SCU, of concern is the composition of SHEC itself.


Reports that there were/are manoeuvres to incorporate SCU into the University of Swaziland somewhat support this position, which would mean some of the members were self-serving.  


It would also be disturbing if there was credence to another swirling rumour that the closure of SCU had to do with shareholding.
It is difficult to dismiss this rumour since it is now currency that any major investor coming to these shores is demanded to cede free shareholding to the powers that be. This has inevitably led to capital flight hence the moribund economy encumbering the Kingdom of Eswatini.


But the heart of the matter in this issue are the implications of the much welcomed royal command resolution of the SCU self-made imbroglio that has been a balm to the hurting souls of the affected Swazi students and their parents.
But this is impossible under the political status quo because this would be harmful to the credibility of the overly protected but dysfunctional Tinkhundla Political System.

Hence problems and challenges are routinely papered over superficially by addressing the symptoms and ignoring the causal factors - themselves offshoots of a problematic political system.
Paradoxically the manner the SCU impasse was resolved is playing to the gallery, perpetuating the internationally held belief that the king is an absolute monarch.


Thus in a way, the solution to the problem becomes an own goal. That is the sum total of the ramifications of the resolution of the SCU saga that does not augur well for the kingdom especially in the furtherance of constitutionalism and the publicly peddled so-called democratic credentials of the Tinkhundla Political System. Repeated denials of the fact do not necessarily change perceptions let alone beliefs.
Typically, the narrative of whether head or tail you do not win holds true in this case!  

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