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Today's News

Every year at least 30,000 Swazi maidens partake in the reed dance for the king to choose his wife. It is one of the popular cultural traditions that has domineered and sparked criticism worldwide. Virgin and unmarried teen-age girls dance bare breasted to catch the king’s eye as he samples for his next wife to add to his horde of wives.

In the past, the ceremony was held to pay homage to the queen mother where. Young girls would collect reeds and present them to the queen to rebuild her royal residence. However all that changed when the king started choosing his wife from the dance as a way to keep the culture.

This tradition has highly been criticized by the donor community and the international institutions such as the International Monetary Funds (IMF) because the king spends a lot to maintain his wives and AIDS activist view the practice as sending the wrong message in fighting against the spread of HIV/AIDS.

Since this cultural practice is more superior to the constitution no girl can say no to the king. Not long ago, a mother of one of the girl’s chosen made headlines when she sued palace aids for charges of abduction of her daughter as the 10th wife. She did not succeed as fighting the King proved to bear no fruits.

This year despite the disapproval from donors, human rights activists and women rights groups in Swaziland, King Mswati went a head to choose yet another 16-year-old girl as his thirteenth wife. Many women’s rights groups had hoped that the king Mswati would be satisfied with 12 wives but according to tradition the king has no limit on the number of wives he can have.

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Good grief.

*Ags plans to move to Swazi-land and attempt a coup-d'etat...*

edit from the *real* jae- Ags needs to learn how to check before posting

That is... well, I'm usually quite the moral relativist, but I find that barbaric.

I wonder how many of the girls object?

I pity the king.

Imagine the number of mother-in-laws.

Crowned heads should adorn guillotines.