International+Communist+and+Workers+Parties+on+Swaziland

**Motion by the South African Communist Party on Swaziland**
=**Restore democratic rule and overthrow neo-colonial and semi-feudal crisis of the backward tinkhundla system in Swaziland:**=

The gathering of **International Communist and Workers Parties held on the 10-12 November 2006, in Lisbon, Portugal** took urgent note of the serious political developments in Swaziland.

Its 38 year old King Mswati III regime is desperately trying to restore conditions of the vicious and authoritarian semi-feudal and neo-colonial system of political rule, through his fraudulent constitutional project meant to restore credibility of the tinkhundla system.

Since his father, King Sobhuza’s 1973 royal state of emergency decree, prohibiting any form of political party organization and activity, the country is witnessing a precipitous escalation of a draconian subjugation against any political resistance by youth, women, workers and pro-democracy activists, particularly activists of PUDEMO and its youth wing, SWAYOCO. This is the longest state of emergency anywhere in the world.

The country is facing deep seated social, political and economic crises. Swaziland’s economy is not growing, the 70% levels of unemployment persists. The country experiences chronic food shortages. HIV/AIDS rate of infection is as high as 30%. Each of the King’s 13 wives drowns in opulence, with ₤430,000 spent in purchasing luxury vehicles in 2005 alone. Land ownership and control is shared predominantly between foreign and absentee landlords and those close to the royal family.

To further sustain its relations of imperialist patronage and widespread patterns of royal elite consumption, the regime has fraternized with powerful regional and international capitalist networks that are privately accumulating in exchange for propping up the dominant repressive and authoritarian features of Mswati’s neo-colonial regime.

In our international duty to promote a democratic framework in Swaziland, the Communist and Workers Parties condemns the current situation.

We pay tribute to the democratic movement in Swaziland, led by PUDEMO and call for their intensification of resistance, re-building of all structures internally and in the diaspora. We are further noting their attempts at the radicalization of the political landscape to heighten the tempo of the struggle, as well as deepen intense debates at formulating a new political programme entitled, “” The Road map to a new and democratic Swaziland” to address the crisis, consolidate the forces of revolution and advance to liberation. We declare our full support for their actions.

The international meeting urges all fraternal parties, organizations and individuals to actively protest against Swaziland’s permanent state of emergency and the Royal regime’s impervious response to global political pressure for dialogue and the restoration of democracy.

We call on all progressive forces internationally, to respond to Mswati’s intransigence through active solidarity mobilization, formation of solidarity structures in their respective countries and to send letters of protest to all Swaziland embassies internationally. This should include the formal application of smart sanctions against the Mswati regime. We also call on the commonwealth to stop supporting the regime and justifying its fraudulent constitutional schemes in an attempt to stabilize and restore the basis of the neo-colonial accumulation path to profitability.

The parties

Sudanese Communist Party Communist Party of the Peoples of Spain Communist Party of the Russian Federation Party of the Italian Communists New Communist Party of Yugoslavia Communist Party of Luxemburg Communist Party of Macedonia Party of the Communists, Mexico Workers Party of Ireland Communist Party of Finland Party of Communist Refoundation Peoples Socialist Party, Mexico German Communist Party Communist Party in Denmark Communist Party of Norway Lebanese Communist Party Syrian Communist Party Russian Workers Communist Party Socialist Party of Latvia Communist Party of India Communist Party of India (Marxist) Union of the Communists of Ukraine Brazilian Communist Party Workers Party of Belgium Communist Party of Britain Communist Party of Malta Communist Party of Slovakia Communist Party of Turkey Communist Party of Brazil New Communist Party of the Netherlands Peruan Communist Party Communist Party of Canada New Communist Party of Britain Communist Party of Greece Portuguese Communist Party Tudeh Party of Iran Hungarian Workers Communist Party Workers Communist Party of Macedonia New Communist Party of Yugoslavia South African Communist Party