MBABANE – The Chairperson of Tindvuna Tetinkhundla and Bucopho in the four regions of the country, Bhekisisa Bhembe, says they welcome the proposed amendments.
In an interview with this publication yesterday, Bhembe, who is a community headman under Lobamba Inkhundla said the amendments came at the right time. He said these amendments would mean that an aspiring bucopho would have to speak out and campaign just like any aspirant indvuna yenkhundla and Member of Parliament (MP). He said for bucopho not to campaign was disadvantageous, especially with those who were quiet, because even after being elected, they would continue being quiet whereas the nature of work required one to speak.
He said no one should earn or get paid for just saying nothing but should be paid for their voice in the development of their communities. Bhembe said the amendments came at the right time where there were people who were coming into the elections with different agendas from their political parties. He said, therefore, when everyone campaigned, it would be possible to detect those who were affiliated to any political party.
Mandates
He said electing members of political parties into the Tinkhundla System would not work as those individuals would be coming with mandates of their parties and there would be clashes.
Bhembe said, however, the proposed changes would now require more time as before the room for campaigning was opened for indvuna yenkhundla and MP but now it would need to accommodate the bucopho candidate as well. The chairperson said, therefore, the campaigning stage would need to be staggered in order to accommodate every nominee. He added that the only amendment they were objecting was the counting of votes in each polling station as opposed to the old way where votes were transported to a central place, where they were counted together. Bhembe said counting of votes in each station might cause conflict as candidates, especially those who would win the elections, would be biased towards areas where they received less votes than where he attained a majority votes.
