By Mbongeni Mbingo [Managing Editor] | 2025-03-31

Events of the past few weeks will forever be etched in our history books as the period during which the pendulum swung.
As to what direction the pendulum swung will depend on which side of the fence people sit.

For instance, you will know by now that the interpretation of what happened at the Hilton Garden Inn this week where EswatiniMed convened its Annual General Meeting is the subject of intense debate, depending on whether you are for or against.

Sadly, and very unfortunately it is not going to be up to me to tell you which side should be the right side. Ask me why.
Well, firstly, those who are working fulltime on spreading falsehoods and counternarratives must have got ahead of me in this, successfully making everyone believe that we the media are for a certain side. So, no need for me to pronounce myself here!

Secondly, I do not believe that we have seen or heard the last of this issue, so all we can do is watch and learn, and take notes from Samora Simelane’s book of cat with nine lives.
Those who have been around longer will tell you that the principal officer at EswatiniMed is not your typical chief executive officer and so if you are going to come for him you will need to come with all your wits from the school of hard knocks and not a corporate book from Waterford KaMhlaba.

Which is why, by the way, the AGM took off; which is why the principal officer can boast that he is in office despite a decision taken just a week prior suspending him from work; which is why four of the board of directors have been removed from their positions.

And let us not forget, despite a court order, police stood and watched the meeting take off and finish, while last week the same police had interrupted and stopped a press conference in the interest of maintaining order.

Despite a court order, albeit an interim one, the Hilton Garden Inn conference room was a hive of activity with people putting their names down as shareholders in a lawful meeting during which they took decisions of many of those who were not there.
Samora Simelane was beaming with such a broad smile on television thereafter – a smile of triumph and victory in a week in which he had to fight to win. As to how long this victory lasts depends on issues that will now happen outside of the boardroom and outside of that conference room and elsewhere, for all of us know that there are still many conversations to be had here.

Perhaps what is striking is that everything happens in the full glare of many of those who should take interest, but in typical Emaswati fashion, they are folding their arms and watching helplessly if not without care. The narrative so far is that EswatiniMed is in dire straights, and that all is not well. But the counter-narrative is that there is a cabal out there, looking to grab this cow to milk it for all its worth.

Where we stand on this is how we interpret the issues as they unfold day in and week out. How we contextualise Samora’s ‘heroics’ will be the subject for many years to come, as the day that we all watched as the corporate war for the life and soul of EswatiniMed spilled onto the public domain and those in power perhaps did nothing – if not that they showed their hand by doing nothing.

However, what is of bigger interest is how the media has told this story that in future we will look back at the media’s own role and culpabilities. That the story unfolds in the manner it does is perhaps not the issue. The issue is how the media has been persuaded, if not influenced to look the other way when it is needed to stand up for the public, or perhaps the barometer for what is right.

The media has had no say, has failed to lead in this debate and has only been timidly publishing what it can. Contextualised against the significance of this war at EswatiniMed and the impact it has as to the larger health crisis in this country, it is almost scandalous how the media views this boardroom war. The media has in many matters not been a bystander more than it has sought to drum up the controversy.

But, who am I to say; after all, there is that issue of the cabal to contend with, and many others that seek to shift the focus of those of us who are doing their best to remain solid in our views.
If anything, the media is now caught out in a period where it is slowly losing its value if not its position as the moral barometer and demanding accountability from all the political actors in this country.

It has descended into the arena where the media’s voice can be drowned down by threats and attempts to silence and censor.
And just as the public has watched with no interest the events at the EswatiniMed descend into chaos and unbelievable low levels of corporate governance, the same public is actively taking part in destroying all that the media needs to become an effective sound of reason – with those in the three arms of government cheering on as if this was some contest for who will land the biggest blow!

Those who study the politics and the conduct of big business will one day look into the events that perhaps shaped the future of this country or the defining moments of a third force in our politics. Either way, there will be a chapter of the media’s own role in watching as the events of November 28, 2002 when a court order became of no use were relived at the Hilton Garden Inn.
Unlike in 2002, the media understood perfectly well the importance of the rule of law and the public was well informed to know the difference.

These days, it is who pays the piper that walks away with the prize – and with the judiciary at its worse since the days of Makhulu Baas, we are all just at the Lord’s mercy, if not that third force in this country.

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