KING MSWATI LAVISH BIRTHDAY CELEBRATIONS: GIVING TETFULO TO A WEALTHY KING UNDER THE PRETEXT OF CULTURE IS TAKING GREED TO ANOTHER LEVE
......Honestly speaking the Monarchy is bankrupting the country. The King gets One Billion a year from the governments yet still the King demands offerings from the Poor
King Mswati III takes at least E1 billion (approximately USD 55 million) from eSwatini’s national budget every single year—money that could otherwise fund hospitals, schools, rural electrification, clean water, and job creation. To put this into perspective, that’s over E2.7 million every single day, taken from a country where most citizens live in poverty, on less than E60 a day.
Inkhosikati laNgangaza and her daughter Mazwezulu who is wearing a Fendi mint coat priced at $12 500, Fendi Snow boots that cost $700 and channel classic mini flap bag that cost $5 000.
This annual appropriation is just the beginning. On top of this staggering allocation, the King continues to demand tetfulo (offerings or tributes) from the same impoverished Swazis, especially during national ceremonies like Buganu, Incwala, and Umhlanga. These traditional events are framed as cultural pride, but in reality, they are financial drains on poor families who are coerced into giving what little they have to sustain the lavish lifestyle of the royal family.
Ordinary people giving "tetfulo" to the King.
Meanwhile, royal birthdays are treated like state galas. The King throws extravagant birthday celebrations costing millions of Emalangeni, complete with imported luxuries, feasts, entertainment, and expensive gifts presented by government officials and ordinary citizens. By contrast, leaders like Julius Malema in South Africa use their birthdays to give back—visiting orphanages and donating to the needy. This shows a stark difference in leadership priorities: one chooses service, the other demands worship.
The cost of maintaining the royal family goes far beyond the budget line. Royal travel abroad is another money pit. Each year, millions are spent on first-class flights, five-star hotels, motorcades, security, and allowances for the King, his wives, Queen mother and a bloated entourage. These trips—often thinly disguised as diplomatic missions—offer little to no tangible benefit to the nation. Back home, the opulence is even more obscene.
King Mswati at a recent birthday parade
The King and his many wives flaunt designer clothing, jewellery, and luxury vehicles on social media—timepieces worth hundreds of thousands, wardrobes stacked with Gucci, Louis Vuitton, and Chanel, and convoys of Rolls-Royces, BMWs, and Maybachs. It is a monarchy draped in wealth, surrounded by a sea of poverty. Then the spit to our faces by gloating about it on Instagrasm. The royal family also enjoys the use of over 10 palaces, all funded and maintained by the taxpayer.
King Mswati displaying a Multi Million timepeace.
These properties include over a dozen Rolls Royces fleets of vehicles, and armies of domestic and security staff. The result is a country where children eatat care points, hospitals lack basic medicine, and youth unemployment hovers around 60%. The contrast is jarring, and deeply unjust. The monarchy in the King is not just symbolic—it is a direct economic burden. The King’s wealth and extravagance come at the cost of national development.
Inside one of the King's palaces
His lifestyle is financed by the very people who are told to tighten their belts, accept austerity, and make "sacrifices" for tradition and peace. eSwatini cannot afford this anymore. It's time to speak frankly: the cost of the monarchy is unsustainable, morally indefensible, and economically reckless. A billion a year is not just a number—it is the price of inequality, injustice, and stolen dreams for millions of Swazis. The ongoing King birthday celebrations must make us to ask; does the King have a country or the country has a King?
NB: Follow Swazi Royal Leeches Lifestyle to see the obscene wealth of the Swazi monarchy. Faceboook link here: https://www.facebook.com/share/1KodEXkmmR/