In January 1997, Comesa’s Council of Ministers established a special committee of eminent persons “to investigate into and prepare a comprehensive investigative audit and management report for the period beginning 1992 to-date.”
The investigation specifically targeted the conduct of President Bingu wa Mutharika who was Comesa’s Secretary General.
About two months later, the committee, chaired by Zambian Emmanuel Maposa Hachipuka, noted among other things, “glaring instances of mismanagement of the resources of Comesa by the Secretary General ... on unproductive, irrelevant and unrelated mission to Comesa’s aims and objectives... Substantial funds of the institution have been used to finance travel, accommodation and other expenses of the Secretary General’s missions. No reports exist to show the net benefit of these missions to Comesa.” [emphasis mine]
Mutharika was duly sacked before the year was out, mainly because of the findings of that report but he blamed his exit on many factors, not least of which were his political ambitions back home.
On Tuesday, September 7, 2010, the Council for Non-Governmental Organisationsn in Malawi (Congoma) came up with its own damning verdict on President Mutharika’s apparent endless trips abroad, some of which could have little or no benefit to Malawi. (A few weeks ago, someone likened him to a world traveller who only comes home to pack a new suitcase for adventures afresh.)
Congoma chairperson Voice Mhone criticised President Mutharika for his needless globe-trotting, which is, to quote a term used by State House Press Officer Albert Mungomo, haemorrhaging the forex given that our import cover is hovering dangerously below two months.
The day the story came out in The Daily Times, Mungomo and some cabinet ministers went flat out tearing Mhone apart and some even cast aspersions on the integrity of newspaper.
Now, it’s worth noting that none of the president’s men disputed Mhone’s observations on Mutharika’s gallivanting. All they did was to recycle the choice terms usually reserved for the president’s critics. Mhone was deemed insulting the president (just a notch below sedition), malicious and ignorant [because] his criticism was “coated with political innuendo” (a Dausism that is as empty as it gets).
According to Mungomo, Mutharika’s globe-trotting has no effect on forex shortage because his trips create an environment for business people to bring forex into the country — which, I should add, will be spent by the president abroad so that he creates an environment for business people to bring forex into the country, which will be spent by the president abroad so...
Now, either Mhone is hopelessly “malicious and ignorant” about the short and long term benefits brought about by the president’s globetrotting or the president’s men only said what they said because they needed to say something in defence of the president to show their unflinching loyalty which was demanded by Mutharika when he was swearing in new ministers in early August.
In the recent weeks, the president has been to Namibia, Swaziland, Germany and Rwanda. And they are two or three trips planned for September. Could all this be the effect of the billion-kwacha flying toy that was controversially bought last year?
But the State House deems it improper to question President Mutharika’s never-ending foreign trips. As a matter of fact, for a man who has travelled to over 150 countries (I hope that doesn’t include the contentious trips in the damning Comesa report because that would be a shame), the State House wants us to believe the president derives no pleasure from his trips abroad. They are just the pain of the office of the president of Malawi and chairman of the AU — and we should be grateful and shut up! (By the way, since January this year, US President Barack Obama has made only three foreign trips — to Afghanistan, Canada and Czech Republic.)
But, nope, there’s no shutting up. The president does not travel light. He has ministers, technocrats, a whole retinue of bodyguards and countless hangers-on. And they don’t come in cheap. And jet fuel is not cheap either. And they all draw forex. But, are all these trips so dependent on the president that no other person — by which I mean Vice President Joyce Banda or even line ministers — could represent him and achieve the same result?
And suggesting that “President Mutharika’s entourage is too small compared to the president of Zimbabwe [Robert Mugabe]” is a new low in the governance of the country. Mugabe is not an example of anything good and to compare our situation with Zimbabwe’s does not bode too well for the nation. Weep, Malawi, weep!
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
Reading into UDF in-fights
I have this overwhelming temptation to cast more than just a cursory glance into the fight — or what passes for one — between the so-called supporters of two presidential aspirants of the United Democratic Front (UDF), musician Lucius Banda and the party’s acting chair, Friday Jumbe.
But my every attempt to read too much into it feels, for lack of a better term, impotent.
You see, that the two Sunday papers last week gave prominence to the match up at Chileka Airport should give one an idea of the enormity of the leadership problem in the party.
Somehow, though, I refuse to be drawn into the feeling that the incident yet proves the indispensability of its former chairman, former president Bakili Muluzi, under whose leadership such fights were unheard of, let alone be countenanced.
Some people hold this view that the fight just shows how much the party has become fractured since the ‘halcyon days’ of a united party (or perhaps, an illusion of one) under Muluzi.
It is a sign of failing fortunes for the party, some would say, but then nothing compares to the all time low set by the “party of death and darkness” (according to the late Chakufwa Chihana), Malawi Congress Party (MCP), when its more liberal minded members made the ingenious discovery that the best way to mend fences was through the panga.
At the height of its leadership problems, when party held conventions to elect the party leader so frequent that the current dearth of one seems very farcical, if not ironical, the MCP held some indaba at Motel Paradise in Blantyre where its members, having disagreed on who was a better leader between John Tembo and Gwanda Chakuamba, were literally at daggers drawn.
It is one of many unsavoury aspects of their history the MCP would like to forget in a hurry.
It is harsh, I know, to compare that piece of MCP’s political thuggery with what happened last Saturday at Chileka Airport where the party’s members went to welcome Muluzi from his medical trip abroad.
And it is for that reason I’m inclined to take the view that the incident at Chileka Airport was a no-brainer and you could say, tongue in cheek, it was some welcome action given that the party has been in doldrums for a while with the ruling Democratic Progressive Party hoggin the limelight.
But my every attempt to read too much into it feels, for lack of a better term, impotent.
You see, that the two Sunday papers last week gave prominence to the match up at Chileka Airport should give one an idea of the enormity of the leadership problem in the party.
Somehow, though, I refuse to be drawn into the feeling that the incident yet proves the indispensability of its former chairman, former president Bakili Muluzi, under whose leadership such fights were unheard of, let alone be countenanced.
Some people hold this view that the fight just shows how much the party has become fractured since the ‘halcyon days’ of a united party (or perhaps, an illusion of one) under Muluzi.
It is a sign of failing fortunes for the party, some would say, but then nothing compares to the all time low set by the “party of death and darkness” (according to the late Chakufwa Chihana), Malawi Congress Party (MCP), when its more liberal minded members made the ingenious discovery that the best way to mend fences was through the panga.
At the height of its leadership problems, when party held conventions to elect the party leader so frequent that the current dearth of one seems very farcical, if not ironical, the MCP held some indaba at Motel Paradise in Blantyre where its members, having disagreed on who was a better leader between John Tembo and Gwanda Chakuamba, were literally at daggers drawn.
It is one of many unsavoury aspects of their history the MCP would like to forget in a hurry.
It is harsh, I know, to compare that piece of MCP’s political thuggery with what happened last Saturday at Chileka Airport where the party’s members went to welcome Muluzi from his medical trip abroad.
And it is for that reason I’m inclined to take the view that the incident at Chileka Airport was a no-brainer and you could say, tongue in cheek, it was some welcome action given that the party has been in doldrums for a while with the ruling Democratic Progressive Party hoggin the limelight.
No contact, no dialogue
To say Malawian politics is founded on surprises is to accord it a sublime compliment it barely deserves; the oft-predictable twists and turns of the local politics hardly come anywhere near there.
But once in a while, Malawian politics has had the feel of surprise written all over them which seem to inject fresh breath into an otherwise dour routine — like what the so-called taskforce for leadership change in Malawi Congress Party (MCP) has been doing in its ‘running battles’ with the party’s president, John Tembo.
The hapless taskforce is still singing the same, old tired refrain about, for lack of a more forceful term, the need for Tembo, to resign or “the wind of change in the party will change him”.
Heard that one before, haven’t we? And since the last time, nothing has changed, much to our chagrin, and more ruefully, to the taskforce’s.
And if the first time it was uttered it bore the sense of being an inspired thought, spare a tear for the taskforce this time around for it evokes no such emotion. It sounds like it is a sign of helplessness, of desperation, of a group attempting to be relevant by reminding everyone they are very much around, even if only just.
Winds of change was very much the symbol of multiparty democracy activists’ relentless assault on dictatorship and MCP’s own impotency and fallibility (circa 1992). For the taskforce to recycle that clarion call now is as flat as it is an embarrassment to the party itself given its heritage.
True, Tembo is politically well past his sell-by date and he needs to leave the stage but if you ask the Malawi Bureau of Standards (MBS), it is hard to deal with products whose shelf life is way gone.
According to MSB, the bureau’s inspectors have felt impotent, by a specific manner of speaking, in carrying out their duties of enforcing standards in shops by confiscating expired products when shop owners have threatened them with the fear of the unknown should they attempt to do so.
The inspectors turn to district commissioners for solutions, who summon chiefs to tell their subjects to remove the threats of the unknown.
I’m not suggesting by any stretch that Tembo has anything to threaten them with, but by and by, the taskforce’s initiative, inspired as it was in the beginning, is becoming to look more like a fight of wimpy children who can only attack their enemies from the safety of distance and retreating at the earliest hint of trouble, even if that is only a gust of wind.
And to think this is the party of the Ngwazi (and I mean the original Ngwazi here) who revered in the twin principles of contact and dialogue! He surely must be turning in his grave at the anarchy in the party that once was the beacon of unity and loyalty, even if much of it was cosmetic.
But for goodness’ sake, let the media be not your battleground, not even your avenue for contact and dialogue. The media, for all purposes and intents, has never been a reliable mphala for settling a crisis; in the wrong hands, it’s one for settling old scores.
The media will feed on the leadership wrangle until the party strangulates itself to a slow, painful death and after that, there be will ironical rebukes of the media’s culpability in the demise of the longest serving party, while others will be self-congratulating for a job well-done in bringing a once mighty institution to shameful end. Silly!
But once in a while, Malawian politics has had the feel of surprise written all over them which seem to inject fresh breath into an otherwise dour routine — like what the so-called taskforce for leadership change in Malawi Congress Party (MCP) has been doing in its ‘running battles’ with the party’s president, John Tembo.
The hapless taskforce is still singing the same, old tired refrain about, for lack of a more forceful term, the need for Tembo, to resign or “the wind of change in the party will change him”.
Heard that one before, haven’t we? And since the last time, nothing has changed, much to our chagrin, and more ruefully, to the taskforce’s.
And if the first time it was uttered it bore the sense of being an inspired thought, spare a tear for the taskforce this time around for it evokes no such emotion. It sounds like it is a sign of helplessness, of desperation, of a group attempting to be relevant by reminding everyone they are very much around, even if only just.
Winds of change was very much the symbol of multiparty democracy activists’ relentless assault on dictatorship and MCP’s own impotency and fallibility (circa 1992). For the taskforce to recycle that clarion call now is as flat as it is an embarrassment to the party itself given its heritage.
True, Tembo is politically well past his sell-by date and he needs to leave the stage but if you ask the Malawi Bureau of Standards (MBS), it is hard to deal with products whose shelf life is way gone.
According to MSB, the bureau’s inspectors have felt impotent, by a specific manner of speaking, in carrying out their duties of enforcing standards in shops by confiscating expired products when shop owners have threatened them with the fear of the unknown should they attempt to do so.
The inspectors turn to district commissioners for solutions, who summon chiefs to tell their subjects to remove the threats of the unknown.
I’m not suggesting by any stretch that Tembo has anything to threaten them with, but by and by, the taskforce’s initiative, inspired as it was in the beginning, is becoming to look more like a fight of wimpy children who can only attack their enemies from the safety of distance and retreating at the earliest hint of trouble, even if that is only a gust of wind.
And to think this is the party of the Ngwazi (and I mean the original Ngwazi here) who revered in the twin principles of contact and dialogue! He surely must be turning in his grave at the anarchy in the party that once was the beacon of unity and loyalty, even if much of it was cosmetic.
But for goodness’ sake, let the media be not your battleground, not even your avenue for contact and dialogue. The media, for all purposes and intents, has never been a reliable mphala for settling a crisis; in the wrong hands, it’s one for settling old scores.
The media will feed on the leadership wrangle until the party strangulates itself to a slow, painful death and after that, there be will ironical rebukes of the media’s culpability in the demise of the longest serving party, while others will be self-congratulating for a job well-done in bringing a once mighty institution to shameful end. Silly!
Opposition has never been strong
Abele Kayembe, the ‘leader of opposition’ in Parliament, is an unhappy man — and hapless to boot. His party president, John Tembo, refuses to defer to him; some sections of the opposition he is supposed to lead won’t even refer to him by his ‘rightful’ title or even by name for that matter.
He should have been a happy man, however. It is not everyday that a leader of opposition enjoys the patronage of the party in power and African politics being what they are, bedfellows of ruling parties never want for anything, no, not even a piece of mind, so why should he have lost his in the first place?
However, unease hangs around him and within the last week, he came to the ‘shocking’ conclusion that the opposition in the country is a lame duck; so weak so much so that unless donors come in to the opposition’s aid, it would collapse on the very threshold of democracy on which it was supposed to flourish.
Somehow, I can’t help having this feeling that he is a slow learner; it has taken ages to realise the opposition in the country is weak. No, sir, the opposition didn’t become weak last week, or even a week before that.
The opposition has been a weak institution for quite a long time, since 1994 for that matter when we had it oscillating between reason in one moment and utter tomfoolery the next. Some will point to 2004-2009 as the pinnacle of a strong opposition. Well, it depends on how you look at it.
An opposition that would heckle President Bingu wa Mutharika in one moment, push him to the corner, but scuttle into the safety of darkness when threatened in one way or the other by state machinery or some loudmouths personified in the civil society and the media hardly accounts for a definition of a strong opposition.
But a new low in the politics of opposition came last year and the irony of it all is that Kayembe participated in and was (and still is) a beneficiary of a sham democratic procedure in which government was given the latitude to choose its own opponent.
And that was brought about because a part of the opposition, in a moment of sheer carelessness, had gored itself to death and the other part had sold out — including Kayembe himself — to the so-called mature principles of mature democracy when it cast it lots with a people already possessing power of immeasurable magnitude. And whatever way you look at it, you don’t need a donor to rectify that.
That said, however, the youthful if hopeless ‘leader of opposition’ had a point when he said the civil society and the media have been compromised and they have largely abandoned the post of watchdogs.
Whenever some sections of the civil society (and I mean those that are still alive) have attempted to point one or two ills in government, the response hasn’t been as romantic. They have been vilified with the type of rhetoric that tramples on the very principles of democracy on which the government purportedly operates.
The media? Well, that is another cup of tea altogether. And, yeah, one way or the other, the authorities have done all they can to emasculate the media using some tried and tested means ... but, perhaps, if you get the hint, that’s a discussion for another day, in another environment when the media shall have been removed from the blacklist of complicit bodies against democracy, er, government.
He should have been a happy man, however. It is not everyday that a leader of opposition enjoys the patronage of the party in power and African politics being what they are, bedfellows of ruling parties never want for anything, no, not even a piece of mind, so why should he have lost his in the first place?
However, unease hangs around him and within the last week, he came to the ‘shocking’ conclusion that the opposition in the country is a lame duck; so weak so much so that unless donors come in to the opposition’s aid, it would collapse on the very threshold of democracy on which it was supposed to flourish.
Somehow, I can’t help having this feeling that he is a slow learner; it has taken ages to realise the opposition in the country is weak. No, sir, the opposition didn’t become weak last week, or even a week before that.
The opposition has been a weak institution for quite a long time, since 1994 for that matter when we had it oscillating between reason in one moment and utter tomfoolery the next. Some will point to 2004-2009 as the pinnacle of a strong opposition. Well, it depends on how you look at it.
An opposition that would heckle President Bingu wa Mutharika in one moment, push him to the corner, but scuttle into the safety of darkness when threatened in one way or the other by state machinery or some loudmouths personified in the civil society and the media hardly accounts for a definition of a strong opposition.
But a new low in the politics of opposition came last year and the irony of it all is that Kayembe participated in and was (and still is) a beneficiary of a sham democratic procedure in which government was given the latitude to choose its own opponent.
And that was brought about because a part of the opposition, in a moment of sheer carelessness, had gored itself to death and the other part had sold out — including Kayembe himself — to the so-called mature principles of mature democracy when it cast it lots with a people already possessing power of immeasurable magnitude. And whatever way you look at it, you don’t need a donor to rectify that.
That said, however, the youthful if hopeless ‘leader of opposition’ had a point when he said the civil society and the media have been compromised and they have largely abandoned the post of watchdogs.
Whenever some sections of the civil society (and I mean those that are still alive) have attempted to point one or two ills in government, the response hasn’t been as romantic. They have been vilified with the type of rhetoric that tramples on the very principles of democracy on which the government purportedly operates.
The media? Well, that is another cup of tea altogether. And, yeah, one way or the other, the authorities have done all they can to emasculate the media using some tried and tested means ... but, perhaps, if you get the hint, that’s a discussion for another day, in another environment when the media shall have been removed from the blacklist of complicit bodies against democracy, er, government.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Some responses are ‘corrupt’
On Wednesday last week, the Global Integrity, an international think-tank, released a report about the situation of corruption in Malawi and other countries in the world. Trust me, it was not flattering.
It was by no means unique. Transparency International, among other international bodies, has had issues with the status of graft in the country.
What was not too surprising was the response by the Anti-Corruption Bureau’s director, Alex Nampota, to the findings, which he deemed empty as they were not supported by data.
The report had specifically singled out Malawi’s fight as lopsided, targeting mostly the lowly civil servants at the expense of the big fish. And Nampota hit the roof at that.
“We have investigated all sectors of the society. We have investigated [the] former president, former ministers, [emphasis mine] principal secretaries and even the lowest level civil servant,” Nampota was quoted by The Daily Times of Wednesday last week.
Who are these people? Former president Bakili Muluzi, former secretary of treasury Milton Kutengule, former education minister Yusuf Mwawa and some usipa too numerous to be cited here.
Now, now, now, Muluzi, Kutengule and Mwawa don’t amount to that much to count for real big fish. In fact, one of the shortfalls of the report is that it fell short of singling out political cronyism as holding more sway than the nature of the crime itself.
Muluzi’s woes in the infamous K1.7 billion case began after he had broken ranks with President Bingu wa Mutharika. After the much maligned promise of protection from prosecution by Mutharika to Muluzi in the run-up to the 2004 elections, one wonders what would have come out of it had Muluzi played ball after the polls.
Mwawa was at the time of his arrest and conviction very much a UDF guy in a DPP government and the ACB had the media largely to thank for in that case.
Kutengule? Over four years and with all assurances that government has enough evidence but his case is moving in no direction at all and when you couple that with rumours that some really big fish knows one or two things about the K20 million Kutengule is alleged to have diverted, you don’t get surprised at all.
So, which big fish is Nampota referring to? How many suspected case of bona fide DPP members, the big fish, have been investigated to their logical conclusion? Nix! The Vwaza Marsh Concession investigation is taking far too long to be concluded, among other cases, and that case involves some big fish in the DPP.
Until the ACB nets the real big fish, not some matemba or usipa, reports by bodies like the Global Integrity and Amnesty International will always be a headache for the graft busting body.
It was by no means unique. Transparency International, among other international bodies, has had issues with the status of graft in the country.
What was not too surprising was the response by the Anti-Corruption Bureau’s director, Alex Nampota, to the findings, which he deemed empty as they were not supported by data.
The report had specifically singled out Malawi’s fight as lopsided, targeting mostly the lowly civil servants at the expense of the big fish. And Nampota hit the roof at that.
“We have investigated all sectors of the society. We have investigated [the] former president, former ministers, [emphasis mine] principal secretaries and even the lowest level civil servant,” Nampota was quoted by The Daily Times of Wednesday last week.
Who are these people? Former president Bakili Muluzi, former secretary of treasury Milton Kutengule, former education minister Yusuf Mwawa and some usipa too numerous to be cited here.
Now, now, now, Muluzi, Kutengule and Mwawa don’t amount to that much to count for real big fish. In fact, one of the shortfalls of the report is that it fell short of singling out political cronyism as holding more sway than the nature of the crime itself.
Muluzi’s woes in the infamous K1.7 billion case began after he had broken ranks with President Bingu wa Mutharika. After the much maligned promise of protection from prosecution by Mutharika to Muluzi in the run-up to the 2004 elections, one wonders what would have come out of it had Muluzi played ball after the polls.
Mwawa was at the time of his arrest and conviction very much a UDF guy in a DPP government and the ACB had the media largely to thank for in that case.
Kutengule? Over four years and with all assurances that government has enough evidence but his case is moving in no direction at all and when you couple that with rumours that some really big fish knows one or two things about the K20 million Kutengule is alleged to have diverted, you don’t get surprised at all.
So, which big fish is Nampota referring to? How many suspected case of bona fide DPP members, the big fish, have been investigated to their logical conclusion? Nix! The Vwaza Marsh Concession investigation is taking far too long to be concluded, among other cases, and that case involves some big fish in the DPP.
Until the ACB nets the real big fish, not some matemba or usipa, reports by bodies like the Global Integrity and Amnesty International will always be a headache for the graft busting body.
...and Ntaba goofs again
And talking of needless defences, DPP publicity secretary Hetherwick Ntaba never runs out of rejoinders to anything even that is way over his head.
The Centre for Human Rights and Rehabilitation and Eye for Development took to task President Bingu wa Mutharika to withdraw his statement he made that DPP youths would be prioritised in the Youth Enterprise Development Fund.
The president’s statement was callous, in bad taste, discriminatory and hardly befitting a head of state of Malawi on a matter touching on national policy.
Malawians of all political persuasions sweat to contribute their taxes into the fund and so why Mutharika become so DPP when it comes to sharing the cake around?
Ntaba, however, felt otherwise. For starters, so said Ntaba, the president was being open in his discrimination unlike ‘others’ who are not. Further, like any responsible parent, the president is taking care of his own first, the members of the DPP, before MCP, UDF, Aford, MDP, MDU, etc, can have their turn.
Well, discrimination is discrimination by any definition; whether someone celebrates it or goes about stealthily or is hypocritical about it is neither here nor there.
There are moments when Mutharika is the leader of the DPP but we expect him at all times to act as the president of the country which has DPP followers, UDF supporters, MCP zealots, Aford fanatics, a lone MDU member ... and surely there was no better moment for him to put country first before party than this. But he blew it away (pun intended).
We know some fathers are irresponsible but Mutharika, irrespective of his prejudices against other groupings, was elected to be a father of the nation and to act one like when the occasion demanded — as it did on this one.
We don’t get discriminated when paying taxes, so why should the colour of my politics matter when we have to share the spoils around?
The Centre for Human Rights and Rehabilitation and Eye for Development took to task President Bingu wa Mutharika to withdraw his statement he made that DPP youths would be prioritised in the Youth Enterprise Development Fund.
The president’s statement was callous, in bad taste, discriminatory and hardly befitting a head of state of Malawi on a matter touching on national policy.
Malawians of all political persuasions sweat to contribute their taxes into the fund and so why Mutharika become so DPP when it comes to sharing the cake around?
Ntaba, however, felt otherwise. For starters, so said Ntaba, the president was being open in his discrimination unlike ‘others’ who are not. Further, like any responsible parent, the president is taking care of his own first, the members of the DPP, before MCP, UDF, Aford, MDP, MDU, etc, can have their turn.
Well, discrimination is discrimination by any definition; whether someone celebrates it or goes about stealthily or is hypocritical about it is neither here nor there.
There are moments when Mutharika is the leader of the DPP but we expect him at all times to act as the president of the country which has DPP followers, UDF supporters, MCP zealots, Aford fanatics, a lone MDU member ... and surely there was no better moment for him to put country first before party than this. But he blew it away (pun intended).
We know some fathers are irresponsible but Mutharika, irrespective of his prejudices against other groupings, was elected to be a father of the nation and to act one like when the occasion demanded — as it did on this one.
We don’t get discriminated when paying taxes, so why should the colour of my politics matter when we have to share the spoils around?
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