Malawi’s Calculated and Manipulative Leaders

Malawi was a de facto police state during a good part of former president Hastings Kamuzu Banda’s 30 years rule. There was no rule of law or judicial system to speak of. Kangaroo courts and traditional tribunal were Kamuzu’s preferred systems. The late Orton and his Wife Vera Chirwa who were recognised as prisoners of conscious by Amnesty International were among scores of other innocent Malawians who became victims of Kamuzu’s Kangaroo courts.

It is not that Kamuzu believed in the fairness of Kangaroo court, he did not; this is why he favoured it because he could easily control outcome of any case. This saved his dictatorship – it was the most effective way of locking up anything he feared and did not like. Dictators hate a lot of things, mostly intelligent and patriotic people. Kangaroo courts were designed for these people.

The ironic thing is that after his presidency Kamuzu and his co-accused in Mwanza Murder Case was saved by a democratic and transparent judicial system, which he denied a lot of Malawians for 30 years he was in power.

It is regrettable to say that today those in power continue to disregard the rule of law where and when it clashes with their selfish narrow interests, as opposed to broader national interests. We saw this with the late Bingu wa Mutharika in 2011, as he sought absolute power, trying to stop Malawians challenging his increasingly autocratic rule through the courts. Mutharika initiated and failed with the so-called “injunctions bill”.
Again, the irony of this is that DPP, Mutharika’s party, heavily relied on the courts to obtain and vacate injunctions, as 2014 tripartite elections results got delayed day after day.

I am reminded of this as the DDP-led administration has decided to disregard recommendations for the revised Communications Act that the state president should not be a sole appointing authority for board managers and members of politically, and, let us face it, financially important telecommunication institutions, Malawi Communications Regulatory Authority (MACRA) and Malawi Broadcasting Corporation (MBC).

As MISA Malawi statement, released on 17th November 2015 has already stated, independence of MACRA and MBC from political interference was key issue in the review of Communication Act of 1998. MISA correctly observes:

“by maintaining the state president as the appointing authority for the boards and management of the two institutions, the cabinet has effectively rendered the review of the law useless.”

The poignancy of this statement becomes pointless when you realise that like Kamuzu and his Kangaroo courts, like Bingu and his quest to ban court injunctions, the current administration is aware of this anomaly, and they are aware that those concerned with governance issues in Malawi will protest at its decision one way or another. But they do not care, so long as it fits the narrow and selfish interests of the incumbency – the stinking “so what” attitude from our elected leaders.

It is this attitude from the people we trust with power that is keeping Malawi in poverty. The worst part is that those in power know this but they are calculative and manipulative. There is no worse thing than a calculative selfish individual with power. Sadly, Malawians have been cursed with such leaders, coupled with the citizenry who are happy to take all the nonsense.

Mutharika must not demand from Malawians what his govt won’t do

“A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody.” ~ Thomas Paine

It looks like the reality of the so-called Zero-Aid Budget is slowly sinking in; it is now at the intersection where wishes and reality collide. For the first time President Peter Mutharika has publicly appealed to Malawians and corporations to honour their tax obligations as his government is slowly coming to terms with absence of up to 40% of budgetary support, which donors are withholding due to Cashgate, and the government’s subsequent failure to satisfactorily address the issue by bringing to book all the culprits and ensuring the donors that there will be no repeat of such a systematic looting of state resources by civil servants, politicians and private business people close to the ruling elite.

President Mutharika reportedly told a public rally recently in Balaka that: “let us all pay taxes to have some money to run our country. We are now on our own there is no one who is going to give us money.” Of course Mutharika is referring to the aforementioned frozen budget support. What is also important to note here is the fact that donor countries and donor agencies continue to fund some of the country’s key programmes in health sector, education, food security and many other areas.

This is important to acknowledge because it shows that donors are not out to punish Malawians in whose name the budgetary support is given. On the contrary this shows that donors are merely demanding accountability and transparency in how Malawi government run its finances.

Cynics would have questioned whether it was a coincidence that President Mutharika’s statement was made around the same time that his government finally released the much anticipated Cashgate audit report, which was instituted by the Joyce Banda administration as a way establishing exactly what happened and who was involved in the Cashgate scam.

I find it hard to believe that the audit report has genuinely been released for the benefit of Malawians. It is a curious report that makes you wonder what was it exactly that the government was trying to hide from the public because the report has very little if anything at all that was not already a public knowledge. Perhaps the secretive culture within Malawi government is now so entrenched that the government is even happy to hide empty information from Malawians just because it can.

Successive administrations in Malawi have ruled and do things with impunity, to the extent that now Malawi government or whoever is in power feel belittled when its taxpaying citizens demand what belongs to Malawians, including information. Yet, Malawi leaders are always happy to ask Malawians to be patriotic and make whatever contribution they can towards the advancement of the country.

Curiously, Malawi government has always felt more obliged to answer or make themselves more accountable to the donors, not its citizens. Well, expect when donors stand in the line of one’s political ambitions, Bakili Mulizi’s third term and Bingu wa Mutharika’s fallout with Joyce Banda when he wanted Peter Mutharika to succeed him comes to mind. Yet donors only contribute up to 40% of the budget, Malawians make up for the rest.

Perhaps Malawi government is aware that unlike Malawians, donors have the clout to act. Malawians are only good at whining. Perhaps this is where the government’s “so what” attitude towards its people comes from? Perhaps this is the same reason President Mutharika had the audacity to ask Malawians to honour their tax obligations when his government fails to take any steps towards ensuring transparency and accountability.

If Malawi government was willing to do things transparently there could not been any problems with be donors by now. This is all the donors are asking for. I am sure it is the same thing that every honest and patriotic Malawian would ask for.

Of course paying tax is a noble duty, as painful as it is. Yet, it also has to be said that paying tax is a social contract between government and its people. People pay tax in exchange for efficient public services delivery. Taxpayers have a right to demand receipts if they feel services are inadequate or if not rendered at all. Simple. Yet, demanding this kind of openness in Malawi is a controversial thing.

So, Mr President, please improve transparency and accountability within the government before you could ask for honest from the overtaxed Malawi taxpayers. Passing access to information bill, which I understand has been gathering dust for over a decade, and opening up on political party funding and political campaign expenses is a good start point. Otherwise how can you demand from your people what your own administration is unwilling to do? It is a give and take situation, not one-way traffic.

Reconditioning the national psyche for a better Malawi

Weekend Nation newspaper of June 21st 2014, a day President Peter Mutharika and the first lady, Gertrude Maseko tied a knot, led with a news story on the first couple’s wedding, titled: “Meet the Bride.” The story had vox pop kind interviews with relatives of the bride and people from her home area in Balaka. Of the many comments the interviewees made, this one caught my attention, and it is a subject of this discussion: “the President marrying their own means one thing: Development to the area.”

For most Malawians these expectations are normal. These were “common sense” views by excited relatives of the bride who has a state president for a husband. Yet, this particular comment points to one of the deeply rooted problems of democratic Malawi. It suggests that the people of this area in Balaka would have expected less or nothing from President Mutharika had he not married one of their own.

We need to realise that as a state president, Mutharika has a duty to all Malawians whom the president swore to serve and protect, not selected few based on kinship, political affiliation or any other association. Mutharika got only 36% of the national vote but this does not mean he should only serve those that voted for him – the president himself rightly made this observation in his 50th independence speech.

The mentality that presidents have to look after their own started during Bakili Muluzi’s reign. It has since been entrenched into Malawi psyche. Today most Malawians do not see anything wrong with it. It has become “common sense.”

After Muluzi fell-out with the then state Vice President, Justin Malewezi, Muluzi went around telling Malawians how Malewezi had failed to develop his home district, Ntchisi, for the 10 years he was a state Vice President. Yet, as a Vice President, Malewezi had an obligation for the whole nation.

Of course Muluzi was well aware of this fact, his sentiments were purely political. He was busy at the time campaigning for his handpicked successor, Bingu wa Mutharika and trying to justify why he picked Mutharika over his deputy, Malewezi and other senior UDF party members. Nonetheless, this skewed ideology has been normalised and it is now part and parcel of the national psyche.

It is this mentality that makes Malawians sit and watch state resources being looted with impunity, because we believe state resources are at the mercy of those in power. Cashgate comes to mind. The Nation newspaper of Monday 23rd June 2014 reported on UDF leader, Atupele Muluzi attributing cashgate to bad leadership. Atupele’s point has some grain of truth. Yet, his statement is based on the same political blame game he is playing.

Limiting the scope of cashgate to mainstream political players and analysis only cannot explain lack of collective public anger and action towards it. Cashgate symbolised not only political greed and corrupt successive governments. It also symbolised a rotten national culture, which makes us think it is alright for our leaders to amass as much unexplained wealth as possible while in power. Atupele’s father, Bakili is as responsible as any leader after him who has benefited from this culture.

For the first time in the history of Malawi democracy, there were political “debates” in run up to the 20th May tripartite elections. Curiously missing in these debates was the issue of political party funding. Yet one of the most conspicuous images of that said electoral campaign was parading of SUV Hammers that may even be too expensive to move on Malawi’s port-holed roads.

To most Malawians, a sight of such expensive cars is something to admire. Those that dare to question it are dismissed as jealous. These cars were only on the electoral parade because our politicians are aware that majority of the electorate have already been condition into accepting this as the way things work. They will not question.

Malawians must learn to be questioning without any fear of being seen as jealous of those in leadership positions. Everyone has the power within them to help shape a better Malawi.

The culture we have developed in Malawi only pity poor people against each other while the privileged political class rule with impunity. We see as “normal” when a cassava thief is stoned, hacked or burned to death. Yet, we admire executive thieves, who stole from the cassava thief, driving expensive cars paid for by stolen taxpayers’ money. Executive thieves have become role models in Malawi.

Perhaps Malawi has not fully recovered from the effects of 71 years of colonialism and 30 years of ruthless dictatorship where leaders were demi-gods to be feared and revered. But these are different times, tables have turned, leaders are now our servants; we must check on them, demand accountability and effective service delivery for all Malawians. The oath our leaders take to serve and protect Malawi and all Malawians must serve its purpose.

Political Party Ownership, Meaningless Conventions & Lack of Pary Membership in Malawi

Malawi Congress Party (MCP), Malawi’s oldest political party is reportedly facing bankruptcy if it fails to settle 3.6 million, Malawi Kwacha – substantial sum for a financially handicapped party. The contrast could never appear so stark with the countries youngest political party, People’s Party (PP), which has just emerged from its first ever convention.

Yet in the long run PP is not any different from MCP or any political party that has ruled Malawi, in terms how these parties function. Every ruling party in Malawi is capable and have usually done conventions at one point or another. Theoretically, a convention is crucial and necessary for intra-party democracy. Convention enables party members to choose their leadership and contribute to party policies. It is an ideal that if conducted properly could help the maturity of a country’s democracy.
This is as far as the theory goes – things are practically different in Malawi. Political parties in Malawi do not hold conventions if there is any genuine chance that its leader would lose their position. Current there is nothing to suggest that this situation would change in the foreseeable future. The recent PP convention saw its leader, Joyce Banda and her deputy, Khumbo Kachali ‘returning’ unopposed.

This is not to suggest that there was any conspiracy, far from it. But this defeats the purpose of the convention and it also denotes uncomfortable sign that no one in the party would dare challenge their leaders. Would anyone challenge these leaders if they feel something has gone wrong?

Likewise, the former ruling party, Democratic People’s Party (DPP) recently announced that anyone who wants to contest for presidency in the party would have to fund their own campaign for 2014’s elections. DPP has come up with this position to fend off anyone that would attempt to challenge the party’s acting leader, Peter Mutharika who happens to be the only within the party with financial muscle to fund his own campaign.

Intra-party democracy leaves a lot to be desired in Malawi. Party supporters who are wrongly called members have very little say in how political party’s work due to lack of political party membership fee. Political parties in Malawi are not owned by its followers but its leadership – only its president in most cases. Membership fees empower party members to hold their leaders to account because these members have a stake in it. The party depend on its members to run and not the members depending on the party for survival, as it is currently the case in Malawi.

This is why political parties in the country lack royal support. It is not just members of parliament that change parties with regime change; party supporters do likewise, they go with a political party they believe can depend on – supporters depend on the party and not the other way round.

Consequently, any party in power, which somehow tends to have resources, always appear popular than those in opposition. For instance, a recent political Afrobarometer Survey has established that barely five months in power, PP has taken over from its predecessor as the country’s most popular political party.

MCP is facing bankruptcy not because is cannot afford to pay 3.6 million Malawi kwacha but because the party is more or less a property of its leader, John Tembo. How many MCP supporters would be prepared to bailout out their party when they are aware that this tantamount to bailing out Tembo? Political parties in Malawi are seen as cash cows to be milked, yet those milking it ought realise that if you do not feed the animal you will one day eat with its carcasses.

Tanzania Thrives on Julius Nyerere’s Legacy

On Sunday, 31st October 2010 Tanzania voted for president and legislative members. The East African country’s elections have passed relatively unnoticed, this is untypical of many African elections. While there have been reports of unease between a section of the media and the government (something African governments clearly need to clean out), the elections lacked the “usual” tribal and ethnic tensions that make most African elections “newsworthy” for the most international media.

The Guardian had two paragraphs on the Tanzania Government’s threats to the media, albeit quoting a press release published by AllAfrica. The BBC (fair play to them) had 2 minutes and 3 seconds voice-over interviews with Tanzanians to find out why there were no ethnic and tribal tensions attached to these elections. The interviewee’s dominant answer was that they were all Tanzanians. One interviewee pointed out that the tribal harmony that exist in Tanzania today was the legacy of the country’s founding president, Julius Nyeere’s.

Indeed. Nyerere’s emphasised on national building over personal interests, “UJAMAA”, which can loosely be translated as familyhood (Swahili speakers may translate this better) – one person for another. This formed what has come to be know as African Socialism; an ideology that has never been popular with most westerners, whose idealism and economic model(s) Nyerere objected. Consequently, Nyerere is mostly portrayed in negative terms: a socialist dictator. His association with communist China only cemented his reputation as “anti British” and “anti European.”

As explained here, Nyerere took strong international stands on African economic and political independence. In particular, he supported freedom struggles in South Africa, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Angola and Mozambique. He dared to speak against the CIA-backed corrupt dictator, Mobutu Seseko and sought a better a administration in Mobutu’s Zaire (now Democratic Republic of Congo). Nyerere also picked fights with IMF as they sought to impose free market economic policies on Tanzania.

These were “crimes” Nyerere committed. He stood up for his country and his African folk. Interestingly, Tanzania faired far much better, politically, socially, and economically, under Nyerere than his critics would have the world believe. According to Raya Dunayevskaya (1973)

“…Tanzania achieved the highest literacy rate in Africa (83%) and also experienced major advances in health care. The single party system Nyerere founded under the Tanzania African National Union (TANU) was hardly undemocratic, since open debate and competitive candidacies were permitted. Nor did Tanzania experience the pervasive corruption of so many post-independence African states.”

They say “bad news is good news.” This rings true on how African affairs are covered in the western mainstream media. This cliche may well explain lack of coverage for Tanzania elections. The elections are devoid of tribalism and ethnic tensions, which would qualify it as “newsworthy”. Given that tribalism has been a constant feature in the region’s (east African) elections, Kenya and Rwanda, in particular, the lack of ethnic tensions in Tanzania is an interesting development – a development that would interest not only media organisations but historians and social scientists alike. Therefore this is a genuine story, a newsworthy material. Kudos to the BBC for their attempted coverage.

The real problem with this story is that it is difficult for much of the international community to highlight these ethnic tension-free elections without giving credit to Julius Nyerere. Meanwhile, Nyerere remains dear to the hearts of many Tanzanians; whether one likes it or not, Tanzania today thrives on Nyerere’s legacy.

Julius Nyerere: 1922 – 1999, RIP

Why Unrecognised Somaliland is a Model for African Democracy

Anyone who has followed African politics, especially the last fifteen years when most countries turned democracy, will be familiar with the pattern of African democracy. Its processes is well standardised across the continent and it is very predictable.

Here is the pattern: elections take place, a ruling party and its candidate are declared as winners, opposition parties protest and refuse to recognise the results; they go to court; they lose the court case and wait for another election to repeat the same process.

Recently, Ghana broke with the tradition and it has become an exception to the standard. In 2008 an opposition party led by Ghana’s incumbent president, John Atta Mills, came to power after a closely contested elections that needed a re-run to decide the winner. Ghana had managed what no democratic African country had done before: change governments peacefully through the ballot.

The Economist in 2009 observed that elections in sub Saharan Africa only change the elite. Indeed, the statistics on African elections confirm this observation. In 2009 alone, there were 24 scheduled elections across sub-Saharan Africa, none of these elections resulted in a change of government.

Sadly one African country that will not appear on the African elections calendar is Somaliland, an unknown but a thriving country in the horn of Africa that broke away from Somalia in 1991. Somaliland has managed to match Ghana’s feat by becoming the only second African country to peacefully change governments through the ballot.

This is a feat that has eluded some of the influential and model democracies in the sub-Saharan Africa including South Africa and Botswana. In South Africa only the ANC wins elections and they have no credible challenge, which puts the whole democracy theory to a test. Botswana is still ruled by the party that won the country its independence, under Sir Seretse Khama in 1966, and now the country is ruled is by Ian Khama, Sir Seretse’s son.

We all witnessed post elections violence that erupted in Kenya after the December 2007 elections. Yet unrecognised Somaliland has just conducted elections that all observers, including its neighbours, Djibouti and Ethiopia have admitted were “free and fair” and the losing parties have accepted defeated.

Meanwhile, Somaliland’s incoming president, Ahmed Mohamed Silanyo has vowed to fight for recognition from the international community. He told AFP: “during my tenure as president I will vigorously fight for the recognition of Somaliland. The world must recognise our democracy.”

Conspiracies theorists and cynics will argue that Somaliland is only conducting itself this way to buy the recognition from the outside world and everything would change after getting their wish. Well I believe it is good to be cynical after all it is a human nature that we are mainly motivated by self interests. This may be true; after all, the age of Jesus Christ and Mahatma Ghandi, who will suffer for others is long behind us. But is is only a conspiracy and it cannot be dweled upon.

Somaliland ought to be recognised. If Ghana is accepted as model of African democracy, why not Somaliland when it is the only country that has achieved the same feat as Ghana? Why is the international community, and yes, including the media, are so quick to accuse when things go wrong but they will not give credit where it is due? If anyone thinks democracy is taking roots and thriving in Africa then on this evidence, Somaliland alongside Ghana, are the torchbearers of it.