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Eswatini continues to ignore calls for probe into murder of human rights lawyer

Nomathamsanqa Masiko-Mpaka
By Nomathamsanqa Masiko-Mpaka
3 Feb 2025
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Two years after Eswatini human rights lawyer Thulani Maseko was gunned down in his living room, there is no indication that the government has undertaken or is prepared to undertake a credible investigation.

As jazz played in the background, music that Thulani Maseko enjoyed, Tanele Maseko, Thulani’s widow and I reflected on life since her husband was brutally shot and killed in their home in front of her and their two sons.

With every blue note and complex chord, Tanele fondly reminisced about the countless jazz festivals she and her late husband had attended together. “Oh Thulani loved this song”; “he enjoyed this artist’s music”; “I miss my person,” she said over and over again.

What happens when the love of your life is violently taken away from you simply because of their activism? When a very present and active father to your sons will not be beside you to co-parent them and see them grow — to guide them through their first heartbreak, teach them to shave or drive, or see them graduate university?

As a human rights activist and researcher, I was reminded by this conversation that human rights work is about the people first. It is about the importance of centring the human in all that we do. Human rights can sometimes be viewed in very abstract terms — ideas and ideals enshrined in treaties and constitutions.

However, as Hugh Masekela, Nomfundo Xaluva and Billie Holiday provided background music to our conversation, the sanctity of human life, human dignity and respect for human rights became so real because the impact on the people from whom many rights were taken away was right in front of me. They were as real as the melodic sounds of the piano and saxophone notes  in the background.

Last month marked two years since Maseko’s assassination, and human rights activists, non-governmental organisations, governments, and other actors have released media statements commemorating Maseko. Everyone once again called for an independent and credible investigation into his killing.

Disheartened and disillusioned


However, I was left feeling disheartened and disillusioned, because Eswatini authorities have ignored this call for two years.

There is no indication that the government has undertaken or is prepared to undertake a credible investigation. Tanele Maseko confirmed that she had not heard from the police handling the case. Instead, she is the one periodically calling them to  follow up on the progress of the investigation — follow-up calls that have yielded no results.

Will the Maseko family ever get the answers they so desperately need? Will Thulani’s killer ever be apprehended? Will there ever be justice for victims of the June 2021 protests? Is there an end in sight for the human rights crisis in Africa’s last absolute monarchy?

Human rights continue to be under threat in Eswatini as civic space, judicial independence, and the rule of law are routinely undermined. A 2025 report on the independence of judges and lawyers in Eswatini by the International Commission of Jurists  (ICJ) explores the difficulties the judiciary faces in operating independently, and the persecution of lawyers.

The ICJ found that the legal profession operates in an environment that inhibits lawyers from acting independently. Lawyers are often associated with the actions of their clients by virtue of representing them. They face adverse economic consequences for taking on cases or clients perceived as political, and face major obstacles in relation to cases emanating from the June 2021 unrest.

In a country where the principles of equality before the law, justice, accountability and human rights are routinely infringed upon, Tanele had the following to say: “We hope in the Thulani matter and the 2021 massacre that we get an independent and internationally led investigation, and for justice and accountability to prevail. My hope as well is that Thulani will speak and fight beyond the grave.”

Seminal


As our conversation drew to a close, one of the most seminal songs about racial injustice in the United States  queued up — Billie Holiday’s 1939 Strange Fruit. The song explores lynching in the country’s South. As Holiday sang the first verse: “Blood on the leaves and blood at the root, Black bodies swinging in the Southern breeze,” I recalled earlier conversations with Tanele about the night Thulani was killed and the horror of her husband’s blood dripping down to the feet of her youngest son, who moments before the shooting had been lying at his father’s feet playing a video game.

That for me has become the most vivid symbol of violence, repression and oppression in Eswatini. Thulani’s murder has left blood on the leaves and blood at the root — leaving a stain that the Eswatini authorities cannot ignore forever.

As we honour a life that was violently taken away, may we continue to uphold the ideas and ideals Thulani stood for until the fight for human rights and democracy is won. DM

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