ROYALTY DOMINATES AS 10 MPS APPOINTED

LOBAMBA – Royalty makes up the majority of His Majesty King Mswati III’s appointees into the 11th Parliament’s House of Assembly.

It was exactly 8:30pm when Chief Gija and King’s Private Secretary Mbongeni Simelane announced the 10 new appointees of the House of Assembly. The announcement was made during a press conference held at the Elections and Boundaries Commission (EBC) headquarters at Nkhanini. Top of the list was former appointed Member of Parliament (MP) Prince Hlangabeza, followed by His Royal Highness Prince Simelane, Princess Phumelele and Princess Lindiwe.

In no particular order, former MP Mfanawemakhosi Jomo Dlamini and Prince Kusa Dlamini, were also announced by Chief Gija who is the outgoing Chairperson of the EBC.
Jomo was an MP in the 10th Parliament while Prince Kusa, who is also Chief of Mdumezulu was a Senator in the outgoing Parliament.
Under Secretary at the Deputy Prime Minister’s Office, Chief Ndlaluhlaza Ndwandwe also made the list.

Senator in the 10th Parliament, Indvuna Themba Ginindza, was eighth on the list, followed by Pholile Shakantu, who was the Deputy Commissioner at the EBC and businessman Neal Rijkenberg, who is in the forestry business and runs Bulembu Ministries.

The appointment of the 10 MPs is in accordance with Section 95(1)(b) of the Constitution of the Kingdom of Eswatini, 2005 which relates to the composition of the House of Assembly. The section states; “Not more than 10 members nominated by the King acting in his discretion after consultation with such bodies as the King may deem appropriate.”

Subsection 2(a) of the aforementioned section of the supreme law of the country states that the nominated members of the House shall be appointed by the King so that at least half of them are females. Subsection 2(b) goes on to state that this is so as to represent interests, including marginalised groups not already adequately represented in the House.

The Constitution further provides for the election of four women into the House of Assembly in Section 95(1)(c) which states, “Four female members, specifically elected from the four regions subject to subsection (3).”

Section 86(1) states; “Where at the first meeting of the House after any general election it appears that female members of Parliament will not constitute at least 30 per cent of the total membership of Parliament, then, and only then, the provisions of this section shall apply.”

The Constitution also provides that the prime minister of the country shall be appointed from the House. Section 67(1) states; “The King shall appoint the prime minister from among members of the House acting on recommendation of the King’s Advisory Council.”

A majority of the appointees, when called last night, had their numbers busy as news spread like wildfire that they had made it into the 11th Parliament.
As is the norm, social media websites like Facebook already had the list of the new appointees and were making fun of those who may have been left out from it.
Notably, the list was revealed about 12 hours after the King returned from the United Nations General Assembly.
 Efforts to get some of the newly-appointed MPs were unsuccessful.
When Chief Kusa was called, his phone first rang unanswered while in intervals, the number was busy. However, when called around 10:30pm his number was no longer available on the network.   

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