Prince Dumisa died peacefully in London on Saturday 17th November 2001 after 17 years in exile. On that day the hospital called to inform us that Prince was late and that we must visit the hospital to identify the body and collect his personal belongings. As can be expected the family were totally in a state of distress with no immediate family living nearby they requested the moral support of the Swazi representative in London who was Mbaboza to accompany them. They waited all day until 4 in the afternoon and called Mbaboza’s home and his wife informed them that he was out. So they were forced to take the bus in the cold all by themselves to witness the body which was completely heartbreaking we had only the nurses to consol us when we saw Prince in the morgue wrapped in a white sheet. It dawned on them that even in death they were still alone!
On Monday 19th November 2001, the wife had to register his death at the Register Office again alone. The following day Mngomezulu and Dumisa’s wife went to the undertakers to finalise the arrangements for the body to be taken back to Swaziland. To Dumisa’s wife horror Mngomezulu dropped the bombshell to the grieving wife that she and the children should remain in London and he would single handily escort the body back to Swaziland. He then suggested that he and the wife should take the body while the underage grieving children should remain behind. What a foolish suggestion to make to a grieving family. A 16 year old and a 13 year old who had just lost their father was to be left at home in London. Were they trying to save money or were they just being cruel and calculating?
She told him in no uncertain terms that there was no way that Prince Dumisa’s body would leave British soil without the family of three on board the same plane! “Go and call the King, and go and call the Prime Minister of Swaziland but Prince is not leaving without us!” At the last minute they were booked on the same flight.
Thursday 21st November 2001 was the day of departure. The delegation who accompanied the family consisted of Mngomezulu, Jesse and Mr. Viligarta. On our way to Heathrow airport, the delegation were in high spirits. They laughed and joked all the way to the airport as his distressed children sat in the same car. How disgusting and insensitive. What we failed to understand was what was so funny? Clearly they had no respect for the dead or the feelings of a grieving family.
The family touched down on South African soil on Friday morning. After waiting at the airport for the body to be released and for a family member to meet us. The High Commissioner told us that time had come to drive to Swaziland. A dirty transit van was used to transport Prince’s body and they saw Prince Masango inside bending over Prince Dumisa’s coffin held down on the floor by three yellow sandbags as if they were transporting pigs. They were completely horrified. How could such a vehicle have been selected to transport him back to the country that he had liberated? They drew the conclusion that the van was used to humiliate him in death as they did in life when they sent a similar filthy transit van to collect him and his family in 1999 during his last visit.
It was a long, painful journey back. At the Swaziland border the Commissioner of Police escorted the body to the undertaker in Mbabane. Masango decided that every night the body was not to remain at the undertakers but was to taken to his village for the funeral on Saturday. Please note that the village did not have the facilities to accommodate a dead body in an extremely hot climate. There was no official funeral as the Swaziland Royal Family lied to Prince. His dying wish was to be taken to the Catholic church in Lobamba but this was sabotaged. In the village there was no electricity, nor running water or proper toilet facilities which added to the living hell of the family. The family cried all night in the rain. Nothing on earth had prepared them for what they were witnessing. Nothing was arranged and even worse they was no priest or minister to pray over the body to pass his spirit from the living world to the other side. They were with Prince all the way to the end.
Even in death he was denied the state funeral he most rightly deserved and the Swazi people were deprived of the opportunity to bid farewell to their courageous Swazi hero.