BY PHUMELELE MKHONTA
MBABANE– The Kingdom of Eswatini has set the tone with regards to the rebranding of Turkey.
Turkey is currently in the process of rebranding its country to Turkiye, after its rename last year June.
Turkiye’s name change was made public by the United Nations last year June, when they were confirming that the country name ‘Turkiye’ was replacing ‘Turkey’.
In many articles, some positive and some controversial, which were breaking the media since June 2022, Eswatini has been used as a motivating factor behind countries rebranding. The country, Eswatini, is stated as a country which flawlessly changed its name from Swaziland to Eswatini in 2019, having the United Nations backing the rebrand.
Confirming the name change, the UN, in the statement, said following an official letter submitted to them by the Republic of Turkiye, the country’s name had been officially changed to Turkiye by the UN.
“UN Spokesman Stephane Djarric said that a letter has been received on June 1, 2022 from the Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu addressed to Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, requesting the use of ‘Turkiye’ instead of Turkey for all affairs.
“The spokesman said the country name change became effective from the moment the letter was received,” read the UN statement.
Since then, a series of articles regarding Turkiye’s name change gave been published and Eswatini has been cited in most of them, being a country that has changed its name recently.
When sought for comment, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Communications Officer, Sikhumbuzo Bhembe, said countries were allowed to freely rebrand (change their names). “Under the International Law States, countries are allowed to enjoy sovereignty and self-determination. This simply means that they enjoy changing names if need be,” said Bhembe.
