Swaziland is no more: the state will change its name, and the Swiss like it

You will not find the state of Swaziland on the map anymore. The last absolute monarch in Africa, King Mswati III, announced that he was renaming Swaziland the Kingdom of Eswatini.

Source: Reuters

The King announced his decision to give a new name to the state at the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the independence of the Swazi people and the 50th anniversary of Mswati III himself.

Now the state will be called the Kingdom of Eswatini, as it was before colonization by Great Britain. Translated from the local language, "eswatini" means "the land of Swazi". In recent years, the King has used the name "Eswatini Kingdom" several times in speeches at the UN General Assembly and in the African Union.

In addition, the head of state noted that there was some confusion with the name "Swaziland": it is often confused with Switzerland (Swaziland — Switzerland).

Some Swiss people breathed a sigh of relief after this statement, because countries are often confused in online forms. Mswati III said he wanted his people "to have a name with which they could identify themselves."