SADC turning blind eye to Swazi repression - Dlamini

MMEGI: Welcome to Botswana. Take us back, how was the Peoples United Democratic Movement formed?

DLAMINI: It was really conceived a while back. It existed perhaps as an idea at the height of the liberation struggle. A lot of Swazi people who were involved with the liberation movement in apartheid South Africa had a major input in the formation of the movement. The Soweto Uprising and other events then also had a bearing on the rest of the sub-continent; meaning that the mood had a ripple effect on the rest of the region.
In Swaziland in particular, King Sobhuza II suspended the constitution in 1973, and imposed a state of emergency, which granted the monarchy absolute power and banned opposition movements.