He Took Cow Dung to Save the King

MBABANE (Reuters) - Swaziland's parliamentary speaker, who has been asked to resign for taking cow dung from the royal yard, has insisted he did so in order to perform rituals to protect the king.

An official from the Swaziland National Council, who attended a weekend hearing into speaker Mgabhi Dlamini's conduct, told journalists that Dlamini said he had had a series of dreams in which he was warned that King Mswati III was in danger.

Dlamini said he took the dung -- which is associated with witchcraft ceremonies in the Swazi countryside -- to conduct magical rituals to render the king invincible.

King Mswati III rules the landlocked southern African kingdom as an absolute monarch.
[an error occurred while processing this directive]