The Kingdom of Swaziland is a landlocked country in Africa, bordered on the north, south and west by South Africa, and on the east by Mozambique and is slightly smaller than the state of New Jersey. Swaziland is one of the only true absolute monarchies existing in the world today with King Mswati III holding supreme judicial, executive, and legislative powers since 1989. The country is made up of one tribe and one language (siSwati) and can boast of being the only African nation to have never been at war. Swazis are a peaceful and gentle people living in a beautiful and mountainous country that is known as the “Swiss Alps of Africa”.

Swaziland is a Christian nation which also has very deep roots in traditional religious beliefs (often referred to as witchcraft). Christianity was introduced to Swaziland not by white missionaries as in other African nations, but in a vision given to the first king of Swaziland as he lay sleeping one night in the early 1800’s. In this vision, King Somhlolo was told that people would come who had pointed noses and straight hair like horsetails. These people would come bearing two objects—an umculu (which means “the book of the song”) and an indingilisa (a circular object of metal—a coin). The king asked the being what to do and was instructed to spurn the circular object (money) and to embrace the book. In 1844 a group of the King’s warriors set off to find the people of The Book and their journey lead them to a missionary station in South Africa where they were given The Bible.

The economy and life expectancy of Swaziland has taken a downward turn with the onset of the HIV/ AIDS pandemic. Swaziland quickly became the country with the highest HIV/AIDS prevalence rate in the world of 42.6%. The disease is most often brought into the homestead by the husband who has been away from home working in the mines or on farms and who has not remained faithful to his wife (or in the case of polygamists, his multiple wives). Each wife becomes infected with HIV and within months the man dies, followed quickly by the women. The result is disastrous, as dozens of children are now left alone or with a grandmother. The children become orphaned and very vulnerable to predators of all kinds.

In this orphan headed household there are no funds to pay school fees, so the children stay home and are not educated. They cannot work and have no money for food and so the cycle of poverty and AIDS continues as they sell themselves to men to survive.