Times Of Swaziland: WHY IS THE MINISTER PROTECTING MHLONGO?

WHY IS THE MINISTER PROTECTING MHLONGO?
================================================================================
By Musa Hlophe on 24/06/2018 08:47:00


Last weekend, so many other commentators wrote about the issues which continue
to amaze us in this institution. Therefore, some of the issues I was going to
raise today have already been raised and no longer need mentioning.
But once again, allow me to touch on one or two issues which continue to raise
questions about our Cabinet ministers’ tendencies of blocking serious and
necessary investigations into some of the public institutions in order to ensure
that such institutions are not mismanaging public funds through corruption.
Firstly, it was Parliament investigating allegations of corruption against the
ACC; an institution set up under the premiership of Dr. Absalom Themba Dlamini,
with his colleague and Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development, HRH
Prince David.
These are the two political leaders who did their level best to restore respect
and dignity to our courts after Prime Minister Dr. Sibusiso Barnabas Dlamini and
his then Police Commissioner, now Minister of Justice, Honourable Edgar Hillary,
had violated the Supreme Court’s order which instructed them to
unconditionally return the communities of KaMkhweli and Macetsheni, restoring
them to conditions they were in before their illegal evictions!
That violation of the court order had plunged our justice system into total
disrepute and the civilized world was wondering what kind of country Eswatini
was.
Now it is the Cabinet under the leadership of the same premiership which is now
resisting proper investigations into perceived wrongdoing by the institutions
which are charged with the proper handling of public funds; such as the Public
Service Pension Fund. Why is Cabinet protecting these institutions from public
scrutiny? What is being protected here if there is nothing wrong?
levels of corruption
For many years while he was still Minister of Finance, Mr. Majozi Sithole cried
out over high levels of corruption which drained public funds; but nobody
bothered to hear him; and now the government is said to be so broke such that it
cannot pay salaries!
In the past, through this very column, I have said: that the day we fail to pay
salaries, the boys and girls in the army shall set this country ablaze because
we have spoiled them by being the highest paid public servants. I pray that I am
actually wrong with this assessment!
Why stop the Financial Services Regulatory Authority (FSRA) from investigating
the Public Service Pension Fund? What is Cabinet protecting by doing this?
We have not forgotten that each time the finance staff have pointed some wrong
routes which funds had taken, they have suffered pain of either being fired or
transferred to positions irrelevant to their qualifications - this as punishment
for having disclosed the truth .
Let us go back to the main story.
Looking at the papers of the Municipal Council of Mbabane, one sees the parting
of the Council and it’s Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Gideon Mhlongo, who is
now at the centre of a battle royal between the Council( ratepayers)  and
Minister of Housing and Urban Development Phiwayinkhosi Mabuza; one cannot help
but wonder how an individual who had left an organisation under such acrimonious
circumstances  can all of a sudden , 10 years later, bounce back in that same
position and alleged to be the most highly paid officer among parastatals?