…This follows that Nhlambeni MP had questioned their identities
BY MBONO MDLULI
NHLAMBENI – The Umbutfo Eswatini Defence Force (UEDF) has confirmed that the Nhlambeni army recruitment race winners are genuine.
UEDF Brigadier General Sotsha Dlamini confirmed that Mhlelisi Gama, Sisana Thandiwe Mncina, and Simphiwe Nkambule will be taken for the following tests. He said these were the genuine winners because their identities were vetted and were found to have qualified to participate in the exercise under Nhlambeni Inkhundla.
The winners will now be vetted to see if they have no pending court cases and/or any sicknesses that could hinder them from undergoing the gruelling training sessions that UEDF recruits usually go under at Mbuluzi Army Barracks.
Dlamini said what was fortunate was that the UEDF has done its job to the best of its abilities. He said the vetting was done before the candidate started racing and they were found to be the rightful residents of Nhlambeni Inkhundla. He said now that vetted winners were identified, the question of their identity would not stand because that should have been raised before the race started.
Brigadier General Dlamini’s comments come after Nhlambeni Member of Parliament (MP) Manzi Zwane raised concerns about the identities of the winners of the recruitment exercise. Zwane said he found out that some of the race winners were from places such as Mbelebeleni and Maphalaleni.
The legislator said such an incident was disturbing for them because some of these winners could not even give assurances of the homesteads they claimed to live in within Nhlambeni. He said some did not even know their neighbours in Nhlambeni, to show that they did not belong to his Inkhundla. Some of the participants, according to Zwane, identified him as Mantini, something that convinced him that they did not know about Nhlambeni, the Inkhundla they claimed to be its residents.
However, Zwane said he would not blame the UEDF for this issue, stating that the military organisation would not know if the winners from that area or not. The lawmaker said the mistake came from within them as Inkhundla and that was something they had to correct, going forward.
He said they wanted a soldier from Nhlambeni to be someone whose place of residence was known and within the Inkhundla.
