22 July 2010

Contrasts

I've not yet shared with folk what my goal over here is, so far I have been totally caught up with the going ons of the legal unit generally and all of the government and civil society hosted meetings on various goings on. I have very quickly become acquainted with the hotels and conference centres dotted through out Swaziland. This coming week I will be staying at the Mantenga Lodge for the SWAGAA annual strategic plan.

My main goal in Swaziland is to set up a court watch program, in order to monitor how survivors of domestic abuse & sexual offences are treated by the courts, in procedural terms. On Tuesday morning for example I was at the Magistrates court (finally getting permission to sit in court without the legal staff wondering who I am), two men were in the dock on charges of indecent assault to a 1 year old. Only one defendant could afford an attorney, however his attorney did not show up for the hearing. The trial is now delayed until the end of September and a woman in court, a witness though I do not know her role in the case, was visibly upset by this delay.

As far removed from the grass roots legal issues as could be, Monday morning was spent at Parliament presenting SWAGAA recommendations on the Sexual Offences & Domestic Violence Bill (the bill is now over a year old and not yet a law) to the Ministry of Justice portfolio committee (awesome!). After the entire room introduced themselves, the order of proceedings and background to the bill presented, entirely in Siswati, the chairman of the realises I am in the room and asks, are you Swazi yet? To which I reply, 'not yet chairperson, though I am learning to be i would appreciated it if proceedings were in english.'

For now I look forward to staying at the Matenga Lodge, it is in a place where there are monkeys in the wild! I have not had a chance to see any yet, despite the fact that every person I speak with says that monkeys are everywhere; the foreigners find them cute and the locals quickly point out how dangerous they are for ones car (the people travelling in the cars don't seem to get mentioned as often). I guess that I have been spending too much time in parliamentary meetings becoming a Swazi.

19 July 2010

Attending Court

I forewent the MDG meeting last week to do what I came to Swaziland to do- go to court. I went to the High Court of Swaziland, in Mbabane. Braved the long distance Khombi ride to get there. Note to everyone as I do not think that I have been fully up-front about the Khombis. There is a group of British volunteers here and the British government has made Khombi rides off limits because of 'safety concerns.' So getting one for a half an hour trip, climbing up the mountain that Mbabane sits on, is dedication to my legal service.

The case that I sat in on involved two wee girls, 6 and 4, who were raped by a man in their town, Piggs Peak (where I went to stay in the luxurious hotel for the CRC meeting). A passionate and dedicated counselor from work was in attendance to provide translation services for the children as they were giving evidence in the child friendly closed circuit camera room off to the side of the court room. It was a little unnerving sitting 2 metres away from such a person and there were more then a few things wrong with the whole process- the defendant could not afford a lawyer and so was cross examining the girls himself. His preparation was complicated by the fact that he could not read, nor could he understand English- the language which a majority of the proceedings were conducted in.

I was very proud of the 6 year old when she was able to come out of the child friendly room and point directly at the accused. She was totally confident and looked a little bit bemused about having to do such a thing, her story and answers to the court was so unwavering and complete you couldn't really blame her.

09 July 2010

Education For Kids

'UNICEF

'UNICEF'

ENTFUBENI, Swaziland, 14 May 2010 – At sundown, Thulani Gama tells his 10-year-old twin siblings to collect firewood while he grinds corn for their supper. At sunrise, he wakes the twins and tells them to wash. Without breakfast, all three children begin their hour-long walk to school in rural Swaziland.


05 July 2010

work work work

I've not blogged for days now, which can only mean that I have been working!

Last week there was a three day meeting/ conference in Piggs Peak, a town about an hour and a half away from Manzini. The meeting was hosted by the National Children's Co-ordination Unit (NCCU). The aim of the meeting was to begin preparations for submission of the state party report to the Commission on the Rights of the Child, in Geneva. Civil society, government departments were available to collect information about the steps that the Swazi government has taken to implement the commissions recommendations to Swaziland in 2006. The are some challenges in presenting the information to the commission, caused by the over enthusiasm of the last report in which the Swazi Government may have overstated the protection of children's rights in the country.

Tomorrow is another meeting regarding the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals in Swaziland. All these international reports are due around the same time. It makes for an interesting over view of the situation in Swaziland, and also for a whole heap of quick reading to bring me up to speed.