“We are calling on all civil servants to join the march on Friday to show their anger at the way in which public funds have been managed,” Vincent Dlamini, secretary general of the Civil Servants Union, said Wednesday.
Hundreds of teachers, nurses, civil servants and students are expected to join the protest, amid fears that the government was running out of money to pay salaries.
Dlamini said the union was opposed to retrenchments of government workers and salary cuts, adding that the protest was also meant to address other issues of national concern.
Protests in the small kingdom often end up in arrests. The last big workers’ strike in 2008 was dispersed by the police.
Sikelele Dlamini, secretary general of the Swaziland Democracy Campaign, said police on Tuesday had disrupted a planning meeting for the march, describing the feeling on the streets as “tense”.
“I predict it is going to be nasty, but we are ready too,” he said.
“Officers felt like listening to what was being discussed because we had heard plans to topple the government were being pushed,” a local police chief Richard Mngomezulu said.
“Police are interested in attending all your meetings as a security measure,” he also told teachers.
The president of the Swaziland National Union of Teachers, Sibongile Mazibuko, said this was the second time in two days their meetings had been disrupted by police.
Last week, hospitals in the impoverished kingdom shut down as workers downed tools over pay.
Swaziland is under pressure from the International Monetary Fund, which last month instructed the government to shape up its finances and reduce its public wage bill, in order to apply for loans.
A Facebook-organised campaign has also called for mass protests on April 12, calling for the overthrow of Mswati, Africa’s last remaining absolute monarch.