The Swazi Secrets Investigation - Another Tale Of Corruption Uncovered

17th April 2024

Swazi Secrets exposes the role the tiny kingdom of Eswatini, the last absolute monarchy in Africa, may have played in the regional illicit economy. The story revealed by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists looks at what has happened in a tiny land-locked country.

The tiny southern African kingdom of Eswatini — once known as Swaziland — has evolved against a constant backdrop: the monarchy.

While most of the population of 1.2 million faces grinding poverty, King Mswati III and members of his expansive family flaunt their wealth, from flashy bespoke watches to fleets of luxury cars.

Now, an unprecedented leak from inside the Eswatini Financial Intelligence Unit reveals how the king's broken promises and his inner circle have enabled suspicious money to flow through the landlocked country and beyond.

Swazi Secrets is based on more than 890,000 leaked internal records from the EFIU shared with ICIJ by the nonprofit Distributed Denial of Secrets. ICIJ coordinated a team of 38 journalists across 11 countries to explore the documents, which include bank records, police investigation reports, court affidavits and transcripts, and confidential exchanges between government agencies in the region.

The investigation highlights the extraordinary role of Mswati III and some of his key allies in supporting a new bank in a years-long tussle with the regulator, the Central Bank of Eswatini.

It also exposes how a "special economic zone" — touted as a way to repair the country's tattered economy — became a ghost town home to two phantom gold refineries channeling millions of dollars to Dubai.

"When we talk of the Swazi economy we can say the king himself is the economy, because Swaziland is emblematic of a country where the entire economy is actually captured by royal interests," said one human rights activist, who asked not be named for fear of retribution.

Read all the twists and turns at ICIJ HERE

There will be more to come about this unfolding story.