HIV/AIDS and Swaziland

Swaziland is a tiny kingdom in Africa. It can only boast a population of about one million citizens, and one source estimates that a quarter of these people are HIV positive, and that average life expectancy could soon drop to 30 years of age.

And so the country's king has come up with some ideas to try and halt the spread of the disease. This king is a thirty-something man who is married to seven wives, and who recently brought his new 17-year-old fiancé to live in his palace.

Idea number one came in the form of a proposed law that would regulate the length of female skirts. A year ago the Swazi government decreed that all girls older than 10 years of age may no longer wear short skirts. Any schoolgirl over that age must wear a knee-length skirt or else be expelled from school.

The rationale was that HIV/AIDS can be combated if young girls don't expose their thighs because then men won't make sexual advances to them.

Not sure if idea number two was ever legislated, but it was to do with the compulsory sterilization of every person who was infected with the HIV/AIDS virus.

Swaziland has had a third idea of how to combat the HIV/AIDS epidemic that is killing off thousands of its citizens, and at an alarming rate too.

In September this year, the king of Swaziland banned young women from having sex for five years. Young virgin women must wear distinctive clothing in public. Other women who are already in a relationship must also wear clothing that advertises this fact. The law lays down punishments by fine or imprisonment for girls who contravene it.

Women have pointed out the many ways that this law impinges on the human rights of young Swazi women:

• it gives credence to the notion that diseases come from women.
• it does not acknowledge that women are human beings, and that all human beings are sexual beings who have the right to practice and enjoy sex.
• it does not allow women the power to learn about sex, disease and their own fertility and to make their own decisions as to how they will decide for themselves what is best for their own bodies.
• it does not help to empower women to demand responsible and safe sexual practices from their partners.

And all is not obedience and compliance among the teenaged girls in the little kingdom of Swaziland, especially because the king's own 17-year old fiancé lives with him in his palace.

Go To Page: 1

Articles in this Topic    Discussions in this Topic