By Tim Cocks and Lunga Masuku
EZULWINI, Eswatini, April 24 (Reuters) - Marching bands blew horns, women ululated and men cheered on Friday to celebrate King Mswati III's 40 years on Eswatini's throne, an institution still revered despite criticism of the high luxury sub-Saharan Africa's last absolute monarch enjoys.
A choir decked in yellow, blue and red to form an image of the national flag sang the king's praises and held up a sign wishing him a happy 58th birthday in the national stadium.
"We have been through thick and thin as a nation," Mswati told the crowd. "It is important we remain united."
Speech-makers praised the king's efforts to develop the mountainous, southern African nation of 1.5 million, which well-wisher Shabusiswa Sibambo, 19, said included free school since 2022 and mobile clinics in operation since the following year.
"We are proud of our culture," she told Reuters, as the king passed in an open-top car in a British military-style scarlet tunic.
Her aunt, Busiwe Maziya, 70, a subsistence maize farmer, remembered Mswati's ascent to the throne in 1986. Her life had improved much since then, she said, thanks to government assistance with agricultural inputs like tools and fertiliser.
"Even the rainfall has been better," Maziya said.
But critics say Mswati's and his dozen wives' lavish lifestyle comes at the expense of a population a third of whom live below the $2.15-a-day World Bank poverty line. His upkeep costs tens of millions of dollars and this month the government awarded an extra $3 million for it.
Anger at this disparity boiled over into protests in 2021, which were violently suppressed, while the kingdom also attracted unwanted publicity for jailing deportees from the United States, as part of President Donald Trump's crackdown on immigration.
"Yet another public waste of scarce resources," Wandile Dludlu, leader of the country's biggest opposition party, told Reuters, listing what he said were unaddressed problems including poverty, inequality and high HIV prevalence rates.
"What a lost opportunity."
(Reporting by Tim Cocks in Ezulwini; Editing by Alison Williams)
