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EMASWATI MUST BE PRIORITY

23/03/2020 08:06:00 Vusi Sibisi

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The window period between the initial announcement of the COVID-19 causing coronavirus breaking out in the People’s Republic of China and the first suspected case to be recorded in Eswatini and, consequently, government’s declaration of a state of emergency, has been instructive on the country’s readiness for natural disasters as well as where on government’s priority list the people fall – at the very bottom.

Long after a majority of countries in Africa, at least those already with suspected cases of COVID-19 but including some who had still not been affected, had prioritised the health and well-being of their citizens by being proactive and took positions with action plans to boot, government was still procrastinating even when the first suspected case had been reported. In the meantime the populace was being stressed by anxiety of a leadership vacuum and an uncertain tomorrow. And social media took the lead ahead of government in (mis)informing, (mis)educating and updating emaSwati about the pandemic and its management in order to minimise its spread and devastation thus sowing more confusion.

In the meantime, some people even joked on the very social media that government was clueless on what to do and was waiting for neighbouring countries, specifically South Africa, to take the lead from whose cue it would then cut and paste into its response and position on the pandemic. By the time government declared a state of emergency, to a deafening applause from the beneficiaries of the political hegemony, South Africa had already declared a state of disaster three days earlier.

Eswatini had also missed out on an emergency meeting on the coronavirus of ministers of health from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) member countries. However, given the state of shock and anxiety caused by the pandemic, which made it daunting to even think of travelling outside the country, SADC would have done well to utilise available cutting-edge technologies such as tele-conferencing and Skype instead of physically convening the region’s captains of health in one place at such a critical point in time when their leadership was required on the ground in their respective countries. As it turned out, it is not only Eswatini which missed that emergency meeting but a few other countries as well.

Deficiencies

As I see it, it is the deficiencies of the political system that we find ourselves in this rut. Our skewed political system is the source of all the challenges facing this country today. Ample empirical evidence of this fact is there for the discerning to behold but one example is the huge divide between the haves and the have nots, a position also referred to as income disparities. This scenario can be blamed on the fact that the leadership is not accountable and answerable to the people. Hence important and urgent decisions in the interests of the ordinary folk are often stayed culminating in leadership vacuums until it is too late. Consequently, the foot soldiers in the form of technocrats and technicians may devise good plans and strategies which, however, cannot be freely implemented, ostensibly because this power does not reside with them.

As it turns out, a workshop to sensitise and hone journalists on reporting on the novel coronavirus organised by the Media Institute for Southern Africa (MISA) with the Ministry of Health revealed that much ground had been covered by health technicians to counter the threat posed by COVID-19. The efforts of these men and women should not go unnoticed or be clouded by often weak and wanting political leadership. As it were, good strategies and interventions the health technicians may come out with, as they have done for this pandemic, require political backing for them to be properly and adequately resourced. Yes, that old problem of scarcity of resources when it comes to issues and matters affecting emaSwati yet there always are resources for celebrations and projects of no economic value whatsoever is compromising interventions against COVID-19.

Apparently, profligate spending by government is compromising external assistance being extended to emaSwati. Case in point being the World Health Organisation excluding this country from the list of countries to receive protective equipment ostensibly because Eswatini is not considered a poor country. The reasons for this are simple, they – like the rest of us at least outside the coterie of blind loyalists - have studied government’s spending patterns over time and came to the correct conclusion that the country was very wealthy. Indeed, this position is also enforced by the kingdom’s classification by the World Bank and United Nations system as a medium income country, which means a larger percentage of emaSwati should be living within the middle class bracket. Yet the reality is that the majority of emaSwati are slaves to poverty and disease courtesy of reckless spending on useless and uneconomical vanity projects. In the meantime, ordinary emaSwati have to deal with poverty on a daily basis and cannot even access reasonably decent health services given the perennial shortages of medication in public health facilities.

Right now, as the nation is faced with COVID-19, nurses are out in the streets protesting against potential exposure to the novel coronavirus because of a lack of protective clothing. And who can blame them for they are in the frontline of this apparent war and have to protect their own health. For without nurses, whatever interventions are activated will come to naught and will not stop the spread of the virus thus imperiling the lives of emaSwati. What will it take for the ruling elite to appreciate that they lead because of the people and that without the people they are obsolete?