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.

Tough road ahead for Malawi’s Mutharika

After days of confusion, court injunctions, accusations of vote rigging and a series of irregularities with the voting process, Malawi finally has a new president. Peter Mutharika, an academic and a younger brother to Bingu wa Mutharika, Malawi’s former president who died in office in 2012, was sworn in on Saturday and inaugurated on Monday, June 2. He is Malawi’s fifth president.

Mutharika’s victory, with only 36% of the national vote, does not represent a total change in local politics; it is more of a continuation of his brother’s presidency, which was punctuated by Joyce Banda’s two-year rule. Bingu wa Mutharika died while lining up his young brother to succeed him. Peter’s victory has accomplished that mission, which seemed improbable when a heart attack cut short Bingu’s life on the morning of April 5 2012.

Joyce Banda, then state vice president, replaced the late Mutharika, in line with a constitutional provision.

On May 20 this year, Banda led her own party into an election for the first time. She lost badly, finishing a distant third with 20.2%, after Mutharika’s 36% and Lazarus Chakwera’s 27.8%. It is the first time in Malawi that a sitting president has lost an election since the country held its first democratic election in 1994.

Mutharika’s much-anticipated inaugural speech on Monday did not live up to most Malawians’ expectations. It lacked the weight and clarity of the speech his brother delivered 10 years ago. But then it touched on almost every sector of the economy, from tomato vendors to foreign policy. Perhaps this underlines the fact that Peter Mutharika is more of an academic than a politician, unlike his brother. In fact, it’s unlikely that Peter Mutharika would be in politics today had his brother not ruled Malawi first.

Most parts of his speech were a carbon copy of his party’s manifesto. The promise of a small cabinet of no more than 20 ministers, for instance. This is a big deal in Malawi, a country that is used to having up to 40 cabinet ministers, including their deputies.

Mutharika made it a point to clarify that he has no axe to grind with his rivals. Singling out his arch-rival Joyce Banda, Mutharika expressed his disappointment at her absence at the inauguration ceremony even though she had been invited

The rivalry between Mutharika and Banda dates back to the time when Banda deputised Bingu. Banda is on record saying that Bingu promised that she would succeed him, but this changed when Peter Mutharika came into the picture. Bingu opted for his young brother as a successor. The row led to Banda’s expulsion from Mutharika’s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Banda and few colleagues then formed their own political group, eventually registering it as the People’s Party (PP). Bingu’s death meant that Banda would form a government, taking her party with her and therefore relegating DPP to opposition benches.

Peter Mutharika and few DPP top officials tried in vain to prevent Banda from succeeding Bingu. Their attempt to stop her from ascending to the presidency later resulted in Peter Mutharika and his colleagues being charged with treason – charges that still stand. With the recent turn of events, however, the treason charges against Mutharika are unlikely to stick as sitting presidents in Malawi have immunity from prosecution.

In fact local analysts believe the tables will be turned, and it will be Joyce Banda facing prosecution now, most likely on corruption charges. Many unresolved high-profile corruption cases happened on her watch, most notably the colossal looting of over $100 million from government coffers by senior civil servant and politicians, known as “Cashgate”. The fact that Mutharika says he wants to bury the past and move on may be assuring but history shows that every former president in Malawi has faced a court case of some kind. Joyce Banda will be aware of this.

Foreign policy

The other key issue to emerge from Mutharika’s inaugural speech was foreign policy. It’s clear that the new president is not sure of western donor support. He said foreign policy would be based on “what is best for Malawi”, adding that Malawi would continue with traditional relationships with donor countries and organisations “but we are now looking for new friends in the emerging economies such as Brazil, China, India, South Africa and Russia”.

It is a loaded and multifaceted statement but it shows that Mutharika is accurately aware that he has his work cut out insofar as winning confidence of traditional donors is concerned. To start with, at the time of Bingu’s death, most donor countries had deserted Malawi due to Bingu’s undiplomatic tendencies, poor governance and his increasingly autocratic behaviour. Crucially, Peter Mutharika was foreign affairs minister at the time; he must have been involved in diplomatic negotiations one way or another. It is most likely that most donors have grown cold feet at Peter Mutharika’s victory. Mutharika’s emphasis on looking for “new friends” suggests that he is worried about it.

Furthermore, Mutharika has inherited a government that has lost 40% of annual budget support which comes from donors. Donors decided to withhold this support late last year in response to the “Cashgate” revelations. Convincing donors to release the cash will be Mutharika’s first task. The president needs no reminding of how much Malawi suffered economically under his brother’s rule when donors froze budgetary support. Bingu died with Malawi’s economy on the verge of collapse – Peter Mutharika cannot afford to start his presidency on this note.

Irrespective of his victory, Mutharika still needs to win the confidence of a lot of Malawians. Sixty-four percent of Malawians voted against him. He won the election via the country’s shambolic first-past-the-post voting system, which does not require a re-run even if the leading candidate fails to get more than 50% of the vote. Bingu Mutharika initially came to power in 2004 with only 35% of the national vote. However, his excellent performance in his first term won him a second term with a landslide of 63%. Peter will be looking to achieve the same, albeit under different circumstances.

Political Leadership must Meet People’s Expectations

20th May has been and Malawians have voted, amid reports of some irregularities and insufficient voting materials, which has caused panic, commotion and tension in at least 21 polling stations, mostly in the commercial of Blantyre. These are worrying developments especially considering that the electoral body had ample time to prepare for the occasion.

It is even more worrying when you consider that these polls have been projected to be the most tightly contested elections in Malawi. This means that the winner is most likely to win with a small margin. It is easy for losers to reject electoral results when the winning margin is narrow than when there is a landslide. These elections needed to be handled with extra caution.

What Malawians should avoid is to take matters into their own hands, even when their grievances are genuine and their anger understandable. On the other hand, people are likely to take matters into their own hands if they have no confidence in authorities handling the situation. This means the Malawi Electoral Commission and other electoral stakeholders have an enormous challenge to return whatever confidence people have in the electoral process.

From the onset, these elections have been full of hypothesises, as it is the first time Malawi has had tripartite elections, it is the first time Malawi has had female candidates running for presidency and the ‘post-Kamuzu’ generation has voted for the first time. All these factors will form a part of post-elections analysis, which should help reflect the kind of country Malawi has become in the last 20 years of democracy.

One thing that the campaign period has clearly reflected is that Malawians have become very demanding; they want better services from their leaders. This was exemplified by emphasis of having “issue-based” political campaign, where policy issues guide political decisions, as opposed to tribalism, religion and distribution of cash and material resources.

A week away from the elections, an Afrobarometer poll (its merits and demerits notwithstanding), projected that 15% of the registered voters were still undecided on whom to vote for. It is a projection of course and it is a shame because it is difficult to know for certain even after the elections but those that have been paying close attention would not be surprised that this time Malawi has had more undecided voters than-ever. Part of the explanation is that ordinary Malawians are becoming democratically mature but those in leadership are not. This gulf is unhealthy and if kept unchecked could hinder the healthy development of Malawi’s young democracy.

Malawians are looking for visionary leaders who will put their country on a development path. I have met few people who opted not to vote, and the common reasoning is that it is difficult to go and vote when you clearly know that your vote will not really change the way things work in the country. The anger that some Malawians have shown at various polling stations has much more to do with their frustrations with the entire political system than it has with irregularities and insufficient voting materials at polling stations.

Human rights activist and former political prisoner, Mrs Vera Chirwa said in her autobiography, Fearless Fighter:

“Our political elite has a responsibility, which they not only neglect but also exploit at expense of our people… it took us [Malawi] 30 years to achieve a Malawian democracy. I hope it will not take another 30 years to make Malawian democrats.”

Malawi as a country should heed this call. Our political leaders have the most important role to play in making Malawi an effective democracy. Political leadership must meet expectations of people or be prepared to lead an angry nation, something no one wants to see.

Malawi: Will ‘Cashgate’ Sink Joyce Banda?

According to media reports, last year’s revelations of high corruption in Malawi, dubbed “Cashgate”, are likely to undermine President Joyce Banda’s chances of winning elections slated for 20 May, but as Jimmy Kainja reports from Lilongwe, “Cashgate” is unlikely to lose Banda the elections.

The “Cashgate” scandal happened because loopholes in the Malawi government’s electronic payment system, the Integrated Financial Management Information System (IFMIS), enabled civil servants to steal money with ease. A forensic audit report by a British firm revealed that 19m [pounds sterling]was stolen in six months. About 70 people have so far been arrested and charged in connection with the looting.

The charges against them are mixed. Some people are suspected of getting payments without rendering services, while others were found with unexplained wealth in the form of real estate, huge bank balances, and hard cash in car boots. In reaction to the looting, Malawi’s key donors have frozen their budgetary support, which amounts to 40% of the country’s annual budget. Donors have demanded that sufficient steps be taken to sort out the issue as a condition of releasing the frozen aid. The forensic auditing report has so far done little to soften donors’ demand for greater transparency and accountability.

The last time Malawi suffered aid withdrawal on such a scale was in 2010, in the twilight of the late President Bingu wa Mutharika’s administration. Mutharika, who was succeeded by Banda (following his death on 5 April 2012), fell out with the IMF following disagreements on the management of the economy. The main issue was Mutharika’s refusal to devalue the local currency, the Kwacha, as the IMF proposed.

Other key donors, including Britain, the country’s largest donor, were more worried about Mutharika’s style of governance. Britain withdrew its aid because it claimed that not only did Mutharika have a poor human rights record but he was also becoming increasingly autocratic. In return, Mutharika expelled the British high commissioner to Malawi, Fergus Cochrane-Dyet, following a leaked cable the high commissioner had sent to London accusing Mutharika of “becoming ever more autocratic and intolerant of criticism”.

The consequences of that aid freeze on the Malawian economy were dire. Petrol pumps ran dry, foreign currency became scarce, and the electricity supply became erratic. Even locally-produced commodities, such as sugar, became scarce. By the time Mutharika died, Malawi’s economy was in a free-fall. Anticipation of the same this time around, which is very unlikely, has contributed to the conclusion that “Cashgate” will affect President Banda’s chances at the May elections.

A recent survey by the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace (CCJP), a local faith-based NGO, has established that “Cashgate” is indeed among other factors that will determine the outcome of the elections, but it is far from being the main issue.

Other key factors include food security, economic stabilisation, and fertilizer subsidies. The local newspaper, Weekend Nation, claims that people in 8 districts covered by the CCJP survey are indeed angry at the scale of the looting of state resources. But Malawi has 28 districts, which makes the 8 angry ones insignificant.

It is also important to take into account that the survey was done a month after the “Cashgate” scandal broke out. It is likely that by the time Election Day arrives on 20 May, six months after the survey was conducted, people’s attitudes towards “Cashgate” will have changed.

Boniface Dulani, a political analyst at the University of Malawi’s Chancellor College, was reported by the same edition of the Weekend Nation as saying that it was unlikely that “Cashgate” would affect Banda’s election chances. …

Dishonest reporting? Media bias and Malawi’s 2014 Tripartite elections

The recently released 2014 elections campaign media coverage monitoring report by Media Monitoring Project has confirmed something I said on this forum last October. Apart from Malawi Broadcasting Corporation, which illegally works and campaigns for the incumbency, news bias is not always a deliberate policy by journalists and their organisations. Bias is often to do with journalism’s structural and systematic flaws.

Among the key areas that have been highlighted from the said study, which covered the period from March 22 and 2nd April, are governing party’s (PP) larger share of coverage and high concentration of coverage on presidential race as opposed to parliamentary race and local government elections. Anthony Kasunda, Media Institute of Southern Africa chairperson has since urged his fellow journalists to give attention and report more on the later.

The status quo is unlikely to change because the nature of reporting as established by the monitors is not necessarily by design. The problem is journalism itself. News has a pattern, a hierarchy: the bigger and more prestige the position or the person, the more newsworthy they are deemed to be, and therefore the more coverage – front pages and main headlines.

It is inevitable that PP would have more coverage, as they are a governing party. Most of the senior members of a ruling party hold senior positions of the state and key public institutions. This makes them newsworthy folk. Majority of news sources and news subjects come from such institutions. For journalists, these are inevitably go to people, for information they need to compile balanced reports – journalists like to call it “objectivity”. It is part of journalist DNA.

This is the case throughout the world. It is more problematic for Malawi however because in Malawi there is a thin-line if at all between political functions and state functions. Folks use every opportunity for politicking. Without any fear of contradiction, I can confidently say that these monitoring results would be the same if not higher for a governing party if media monitoring was to be done any other period and not during electoral campaign.

In 1970s Johan Galtung and Mari H. Ruge of Peace Research Institute in Oslo, Norway, published what has become an influential a study in the area of journalism and news media. In it the two scholars outlined 12 factors, which they observed are what make news. They called these news values. Among these 12 values there is what they observed as journalism’s obsession with elite persons. This is what concerns our case. The two noted:

“The media pay attention to rich, powerful, famous and infamous. Stories about important people get most coverage. Hence the American President gets more coverage than your local councillor.”

The hierarchy is clear from this observation. It is easy to see where the Media Monitoring Project findings on 2014 campaign coverage are coming from. The president’s office is higher on journalists’ perking order of importance, followed by MPs, councillors are least important. It is most likely that this is one of the key issues that have convinced the local media to rate PP, MCP, DPP and UDF as the country’s ‘main’ political parties.

The live broadcasts of election debates, notably by Zodiak Broadcasting Station is a prime example. Only these ‘main’ parties were invited, leaving out perceived lesser-known candidates, seven of them – not newsworthy enough. Now if this is not political bias, then what is it? Political parties in Malawi have no membership. Therefore, the judgement on the size of a party remains a hypothesis, not on any proven fact.

The problem with this is that candidates are given coverage based on reputation and not strength of their policies. If anything, what makes these four parties ‘bigger’ is the fact they are the only ones that have governed Malawi before. They have built their foundations on state resources. DPP and PP initially got into government through the back door. Nobody elected them, now they are considered big and therefore more newsworthy, deserving our attention.

Yet, the Katsonga brothers, George Nnesa, Helen Singh and other ‘lesser’ mortals in the forthcoming elections may have sound and achievable policies for Malawi but they are denied a platform to showcase what they are capable of. Malawi stands to lose out. Good policies have nothing to do with political party size. Instead of concentrating on individuals and their political parties journalists should concentrate on policies. But they will not, it is harder to try and make sense of policies than concentrating on elite individuals, whether they talk sense or not.

Everyone involved in Malawi cashgate should never hold public office again

“Pay attention you stupid people, who have eyes, but cannot see, and have ears, but cannot hear… Just as hunter fills a cage with birds, they have filled their houses with loot, that is why they’re powerful and rich, why they’re fat and well fed. There is no limit to their evil deeds. They do not give orphans their rights or show justice to the oppressed.” Jeremiah 5 v 21-31

The Capital Hill looting, well known as Cashgate has clearly become a case about individuals, mostly political players; no longer a national disaster it is. Let us discount the fact that Malawi is a country always on the brink of some crisis, the biggest story in the past week was donor’s freezing of annual budget support, not the arrest of Ralph Kasambara. Neither was it fugitives, Pika Manondo and Osward Lutepo handing themselves in to the police after some weeks on the run. The fact that the biggest story continues to play a second fiddle to the Cashgate running story that could take years to be resolved is a good example of our twisted priorities.

Does anyone know what the government intends to do to plug the gapping hole on 2013/14 national budget, which the aid freeze has caused? Will the government revise the budget or they will sit and hope the donors who provided up 40% of the budget will soften their positions? Is this not the discussion we currently need rather than only occupy ourselves with gossip on what Manondo and Lutepo discussed during their alleged encounter in jail? Malawians are very good finger-pointing and personalised politics yet always reluctant to hold the power to account and instil some integrity into our shambolic public institutions. We are a sad lot.

The major culprit here is the materialistic and self-loathing culture we have natured, as a nation. A huge majority of Malawians are preoccupied with nothing but pursuit of personal riches. Folks are determined to get those riches by any means necessary – those who can run are fine, those who cannot run are doomed. Getting rich is no longer means to an end – having necessities in life. Becoming rich is now an end itself. The problem is that Malawi is not a producing country; it is a consumer state. Now where are folks supposed to get these desired riches if not stealing from ourselves?

A minority class of wealth Malawians, envied by the majority of population that leave from hand to mouth has emerged in the last decade or also. This is why Cashgate is a spectacle that all Malawians are keenly watching, they want see who among flashy uptown people are going to be implicated in this sickening public embezzlement. This is not because most Malawians really care about recovering the lost public money, there should have been more public anger if this was the case; it is because most folks are eager to see yesterday’s kings becoming prisoners. The political establishment has taken advantage of this myopic view. That is why the country is occupied with Cashgate arrest ignoring the aim freeze, deteriorating hospital conditions, rising inflation etc.

That is the ugly face of kleptocracies, which is what Malawi has become; a republic ruled by the rich and for the rich. The rest must spectate and the media must be a good umpire and observe the rules; it should not be allowed to make the ruling elite uncomfortable. The acrimonious press conference Joyce Banda conducted after her 3 weeks stay in United States is a perfect case. Journalists felt the heat for asking questions that challenged kleptocrats. This is how kleptocracies work; setting the pace and acceptable standards for the ruled, anything outside that framework must be nullified.

Yet, we cannot afford to submit to such way of doing things and ignore the voice of reason inside all of us. Sorting out this mess will take a collective effort of all well meaning Malawians; the country is never short of patriots. Other countries have also had to deal with recycled politicians and kleptocracies, far much worse than Malawi. After years of misrule and dictatorships, Guatemala, a Central American country finally decided to ban relatives of a president from standing for office.

According to The Economist magazine, relatives is defined in Guatemalan constitution as someone who falls within the fourth grade of one’s own blood relatives, up to and including cousins – and the second grade of one’s in-laws (up to grandparents and grandchildren).

For a start, I cannot see Malawi parliament passing this law even if it was drafted, it is a threat to whole the political establishment. Just as access to information bill that MPs have refused to even debate for over a decade. Recall provision, which empowered people to remove underperforming MPs, was the first law to be repealed if my memory saves me right. It threatened the political establishment.

Still we must demand accountability from our leadership and in the light of Cashgate scandal, the line of thinking that I agree with is to put a law in place that should stop anyone who have been involved or benefited from public looting and/ or has any criminal convictions from standing for public office.

This should also be the case for any political party involved in any form of corruption or benefiting from theft of corrupt practises; they must be disbanded and deregistered. I know our constitution allow previous offenders to run for public office after 7 years. This must change. I believe it was a serious oversight by drafters of the law. Do they not say a leopard never change its spots?

Reading Malawi Politics Through Joyce Banda’s First Hundred Days in Office

President Joyce Banda has just celebrated 100 days in office, a very short period for any tangible assessment on her leadership. And the media analysis of the event reflected this fact – it had very little to say about Banda’s policies other than obvious comparisons with her predecessor, Bingu wa Mutharika.

Such comparisons are inevitable and of course happen all over the world. Yet in Malawi’s case such limitations also reflects a specific issue: the lack of any significant party policies and ideological fault-lines on the local political landscape. This inevitably leads to personalised politics, and the electorate are forced to try and distinguish between a haze of politicians to determine which way to vote.

Like the two preceding administrations since Malawi’s return to democracy in 1994, the current regime does not really have any policies to speak of. It is difficult if not impossible to see what President Banda’s administration will do next after “correcting” all the wrongs of the Mutharika administration.

A lack of a clear policy line is an enduring feature of Malawi politics, decisions are made on the go. A political party or any candidate in Malawi wins elections without any campaign manifesto where one ought to set out their policies.

It is from this background that the dominating opinion among analysts is that President Banda has the 2014 elections to lose.

The view is that it works to her advantage that she is not a Mutharika and that she managed to distance herself from the Mutharika regime when it lost all popularity – nothing to do with what she will do or will not do for Malawi. In 2004 former president Bakili Muluzi successfully campaigned for Mutharika largely on the grounds that Mutharika was not John Tembo – a remnant of Kamuzu Banda’s 31 years of brutal dictatorship.

Like all the former presidents before her, President Banda has started well. Insofar as praises go, she has had them in abundance, at home and abroad. All this for her reversal of Muthaika’s unpopular and sometimes catastrophic policies that set him at odds with influential donors and the international community in general.

Yet, President Banda has done this by default: she needed to gain the confidence of the donor community in order to revamp a faltering economy she inherited from Mutharika. Credit to her for knowing what was needed, and she has done it with some level of success: fuel queues that epitomised Mutharika’s last months in office have disappeared, electricity outages have somewhat eased and foreign currency is increasingly available via official outlets.

President Banda like anyone in her position would need time and space to adjust, especially that her ascent to the highest office was incidental (not necessarily accidental as she was a vice president). Yet it is also important to remember that president Banda leads her own political party that should have had national policies.

In short, the first 100 days of President Banda have shown that the backbone of the Malawi politics is still intact – politics and the running of government in the country is business as usual. There are more continuities and less change.

Currently, the most visible feature of local politicians are two opposing sudes , fearlessly facing each other: Mutharika’s apologists at one end and Banda’s cheerleaders on the other. Banda has played her cards carefully, nonetheless. She has appointed into her cabinet some of the political heavyweights that would have formed a formidable opposition to her regime. This has severely weakened the opposition.

Apart from Mutharika’s Democractic Progressive Party all the political parties represented in parliament are more or less working with President Banda. In Malawian politics this makes it nearly impossible that all those political parties working with the incumbent will be preparing for the 2014 elections against Banda’s People’s Party. Meanwhile, president Banda has her sights on 2014 elections. While it is not a foregone conclusion, it has to be said that so far President Banda has the 2014 presidential election to lose.

Malawi’s Zero-sum Democracy: The Case of South Korea Labour Export

The story that governments of Malawi had struck a deal South Korea to export labour turned that it was yet another pack of lies and deceit. If there’s any truth in it then it probably lays somewhere between the government of Malawi’s claim that it was a done deal and South Korea’s denial of such agreement. About two months later, Malawi has moved on to other issues, this story is dead in the water.

This epitomises successive Malawi governments, since the country’s return to multiparty democracy in the mid 1990s, close to zero locally initiated policies are seen through to the end, and that is how government resources are spent. The country is littered with unfinished projects. How much ministry of labour spent setting and promoting the South Korean scheme is unknown and the likelihood is that the public will never know. Because the story is now dead and there is no legal provision that empowers the taxpayer to demand information on how their money is spent.

This is how democratic Malawi is run. Successive regimes have always come up with quick-fix, populist policies that are only aimed at exciting people in short term and help the ruling party return power at the turn of five year electoral interval. No long-term policies to help Malawi wean itself off aid dependency, for instance. Nearly 40% of Malawi annual budget is subsidised by the donor community. The country’s economy nearly collapsed two years ago when Malawi’s late President, Bingu wa Mutharika foolishly decided to bite a hand that feeds – he became hostile towards donors. Donors packed their bags and leave the country to fend for itself. Mutharika portrayed himself as a victim of neo-colonialism and western imperialism, which to some extent he was but the main issue was and remains Malawi over dependence on foreign aid.

Mutharika resorted to local borrowing, meanwhile lying to Malawians that its initiative of spending no more than it could raise locally (zero deficit budget) was working. The truth of the matter only came out after President Joyce Banda seceded wa Mutharika in April 2012. The Finance Minister who oversaw the lies on ‘success’ of zero budget deficit, Ken Lipenga still holds the same portfolio. An inquiry setup by President Banda apparently established that Lipenga was not aware that the government was surviving on local borrowing. In any case this amounted to incompetence anyway. One wonders if there is anything that would stop Mr Lipenga lying to Malawians again.

Everything and anything that can help you win elections in Malawi is game, ethical or not. Ethics are not part of the game in fact. Lipenga is seen as an asset in the ruling party, so he must be taken care of. Knowing this fact, it is not surprising that President Banda’s administration is leaving no stoned unturned in its pretence that it is concerned about a huge youth unemployment rate in the country. Youth unemployment is a global problem at the moment but this cannot be President Banda’s mitigating factor, each government must sort out its own. Thus, Malawi government wanted to be seen trying to do something youth unemployment. After all Malawi has tripartite elections in May 2014 in which President Banda’s People’s Party contest. 65% of Malawi’s 14 million people are aged between 15 and 35. Thus, the youth forms a huge voting block.

The move to export labour drew a considerable amount of criticism and protest. Some have accused the government of initiating modern day slavery and others have referred to it as government sponsored brain drain. These are strong words that cannot be ignored. Yet the level of unemployment and helplessness, especially among the youth in the country means that there are thousands of young men and women ready to takes risks in search of a better life in places they have no idea about.

Now there is deafening silence on the issue as the country has moved on to other hot topics. Government resources spent on lies, suffering youths lied to and deceiving ministers maintaining their portfolios to lie and deceive again. This is a story of Malawi, a story of impunity; tale of a system that is very good at capitalising on people’s mystery while masquerading as its saviour. Those that are outraged by such system and speak out against it are labelled “controversial”, trouble-markers up in arms against the ruling part, which is a de facto government in Malawi. The country thrives on “you are either with us or you are with them” kind of totalitarian kind of politics; a zero-sum game. Sadly, no successful nation has ever been built on such foundation.

Shredding of Public Institutions in Malawi

The Daily Times of Friday, July 26, 2013 had a screaming front-page headline: “JB defies court order”. The story is on President Joyce Banda’s decision to go ahead with elevation of Traditional Authority (TA) Chikowi, in Zomba, to a senior chief on the following Saturday, July 27 in an apparent disregard for a court order stopping the initial installment of Mariam Saiti as a TA.

There is a family dispute on the succession of the chieftaincy. One side of the three families that exchange the chieftaincy placed their faith in the justice system and sought a court injunction through lawyer, Wapona Kita, to stop Saiti’s installation; an injunction was granted, according to Kita but Zomba District Commissioner Harry Mtumbuka Phiri has denied that his officer was saved with the court order, therefore paving way for Banda to elevate the chief.

However, Kita insists that the injunction was saved and “if the court rules that the person who is being elevated is not the rightful heir to the throne then we will start all over again”, The Daily Times quoted Kita. According to the newspaper, Banda is not a stranger to the dispute as she has previously lived with one of the families from the grieved side in Zomba police lines.

“The President is a close friend of our family from way back when we were living together in police lines in Zomba … when we exhausted all channels to amicably settle the dispute, we requested to have an audience with the President to mediate but she ignored all our communication”, Roselyn Mankhwala from the grieved side told The Daily Times.

Disclaimer: I am not an expert on chieftaincy issues nor I am I a legal expert but this case has an important governance issue at its heart, this is way beyond the succession dispute. A lot of public resources will be used for the elevation. The public outcry about the president’s travels is well documented and now you can add this one on the list. This could turned out to be even more wasteful should the court rule that Saiti is not the rightful heir to throne. Public resources wasted and deepening animosity for the concerned families.

President Banda’s knowledge of the issue not withstanding, why can she not wait for the court ruling first? Shouldn’t Banda as a president play a uniting figure in such matters? Here it is irrelevant whether the Zomba District Council was received the injunction or not. It is clear that Banda is aware of the dispute, through the family connection. Even if she was not, does she do these elevations without background checks?

Ignoring a court order is a disregard for basic democratic principle: separation of powers. This is designed to strengthen good governance; it guards against abuse of power, which is seemingly the case here. What if every Malawian decides to do likewise? Is it not a chaotic country we are creating? It is important to remember that might does not make it right.

At the height of the late Bingu wa Mutharika’s short-lived autocracy, the renowned Malawian academic, Thandika Mkandawire, bemoaned what he called the “shredding” of public institutions in Malawi. This looks agonisingly similar, it is now well and truly entrenched into the political system and every caring Malawian should be concerned about it. In his own wards, here is what Mkandawire said:

“DR. Banda bequeathed Malawi three institutions that gave a good start towards democratic consolidation: (A) a relatively independent judiciary, since the political cases were handled by the traditional courts; (B) a depoliticized military since the political side was handled by paramilitary young pioneers and (C) and a fairly competent civil service. It is these institutions that ensured us a peaceful referendum.

“DR. Banda further gave legitimacy and credibility to these institutions by accepting both results of the referendum and the first democratic elections. Muluzi in his own way strengthened the legitimacy of these institutions by accepting, albeit reluctantly, their ruling on Dr. Banda and the Tembos. He accepted the parliament’s rejection of his third bid. To appreciate the full value of the legacy one has to consider the cases of many African countries where these were severely compromised during one-party rule.

“Such countries have had huge political problems with their democratization since they have no credible institutions to adjudicate even the simplest of squabbles. In Malawi all political actors have respected the courts and sought to redress their grievances through the court system. Malawi had more litigations going on than the entire SADC region. One can point to some of the abusive aspects of these litigations but all in all they are partly evidence of the faith in our court system.

“When Bingu came to power he promised to reverse the creeping trend towards the politicization of these institutions. He specifically promised to strengthen the meritocratic basis of the civil service. What we are witnessing now is the shredding of the legitimacy of these institutions by politicizing them and by implying their daily management of their affairs depends on “orders from above”. The institutions are now being pitted against another.

“… Those in power now should remember their own future will also depend on how well these institutions are.”

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.