By The Guardian (World News) | Created at 2024-09-26 12:30:15 | Updated at 2024-09-30 13:36:04
4 days ago
The leader of Eswatini’s main opposition party is in a critical but stable condition after allegedly being poisoned in what has been described by allies as an assassination attempt.
Mlungisi Makhanya is in a hospital in South Africa after allegedly being poisoned on Tuesday at his home in the capital Pretoria, where he was living in exile from Africa’s last absolute monarchy, said Penuel Malinga, the secretary general of the People’s United Democratic Movement party (Pudemo).
“This is a clear assassination attempt by the [Eswatini] state,” Malinga alleged.
Alpheous Nxumalo, an Eswatini government spokesperson, rejected the claim. “It is not in our policy as the government to either kill or poison people who hold a different political view in our country,” he said.
“Mr Mkhanya was not wanted in Eswatini,” he said, adding that the accusation was “an allegation that remains without evidence”.
Eswatini has been led by King Mswati III since 1986, when he succeeded his father at the age of 18. Mswati rules the landlocked southern African country by decree and political parties are banned from participating in elections.
Now 56, he is due to take his sixteenth wife and has been criticised for his lavish lifestyle in a country where most of the population lives in poverty.
Malinga said Makhanya had been served poisoned food and locked in his bedroom by an unnamed cook. Those who came to his aid when he called by phone for help had to break the door down, he said.
Malinga said the police were investigating the alleged poisoning and that doctors expected Makhanya, who was currently unable to speak, to recover in around two weeks.
A spokesperson for the South African police did not respond to a request for comment.
Last year, Thulani Maseko, a human rights lawyer and Pudemo member, was shot dead at home in Eswatini in front of his wife and children. The government promised to investigate the killing, but no one has yet been brought to justice. Makhanya had labelled it a political assassination.
Hours before Maseko’s death, Mswati had said activists “started the violence first,” adding: “People should not shed tears and complain about mercenaries killing them.”
At least 46 people were killed by security forces in response to pro-democracy protests in the country of 1.2 million people in 2021, according to Human Rights Watch.
