Times Sunday
28 September 2008
MBABANE— Mbabane East Member of Parliament contenders Esther Dlamini and Jabulani Nxumalo exchanged heated words during election process yesterday at KaBoyce Primary School.
The source of the verbal showdown was a picture used to aid Nxumalo’s campaign.
Nxumalo confirmed the altercation although he downplayed its magnitude.
He said his photo was found planted at Dlamini’s camp, just 500 metres from the polling station. He said this irked Dlamini’s supporters who then reported the incident to the police. He said the actual confrontation took place while he was trying to clarify his side of the story before the police.
"It was just a minor confrontation," emphasised Nxumalo. He alleged that this was a ploy by Dlamini’s camp to disqualify him.
"My agents and supporters could have not done this since everybody knows me around here. I think these were just efforts to create circumstances to disqualify me. This was sorted though as I told them that the law dictates that candidate’s pictures should be 500 metres from the polling station. Their argument was made more baseless by the fact that Dlamini’s picture was also there and bigger than mine," explained Nxumalo. Nxumalo also promised to respect any outcome of the election as the people would have made their choice (spoken).
Esther Dlamini said their dispute emanated from the fact that two of Nxumalo’s agents (bogalajane) were seen three times at the Msunduza market’s food outlets showing the electorate pictures of Nxumalo and telling them to vote for him. Paulos Dvuba and Africa Dlamini, who are Nxumalo’s agents, were spotted by Esther’s agents telling people who have already voted to vote for Nxumalo. While doing this they were displaying Nxum-alo’s pictures. On another note, EBC’s Ncumbi Maziya is reported to have sent back a girl wearing a T-shirt with Esther Dlamini’s picture.
Dlamini explained that the said girl was wearing a jacket on top of the T-shirt and had zipped the jacket. She also argued the fact that this girl was spotted by Nxumalo out of all the people who were inside the polling station.
She registered her concern as to how Nxumalo knew that the girl was wearing the T-shirt beneath her jacket.
Disqualify
"This was just a perfectly acted move to get a require-ment to disqualify me. Out of all the people Nxumalo spotted this girl and he instructed her to remove the jacket. How did Nxumalo know that the girl was wearing the T-shirt because she had her jacket zipped up to the collar?" complained Dlamini.
On a light and refreshing note Pigg’s Peak and Nkilongo MPs Hlobsile Ndlovu and Trusty Gina visited Esther Dlamini during her hour of need, in what appeared to be women solidarity move yesterday at KaBoyce Primary School.
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