On the front page of last week’s Weekend Nation, there was a tear-jerking picture of some Malawians standing in long and winding queues at Masintha Admarc Depot waiting to buy maize. The picture alone, speaks loud about how this is not the best of times to be Malawian.
The future looks grim and, each day, we are edging closer to attaining the unenviable s tatus of a failed state.
Almost nothing is going on well and the hunger situation has just made things turn from bad to worse, and what is most frightening is that we seem to be a nation that has exhausted its quota of ideas on how to do things right.
Elsewhere, where people take pride in their country and would do anything to correct things when they are wrong, this could have been a time to walk at the same pace and speak the same language other than the confused Tower of Babel that we have become.
Normally, this is supposed to be a time the government started proving to people why it is called government but instead it has chosen to play evasive and, at times, employed silly tactics of trying to divert people’s attention. Take for instance that paranoid statement that someone is out there to overthrow the incumbent president. To me, and many others that think straight, when a government starts making such laughable and flimsy statements, it clearly means that it has gone bonkers and does not know what to do.
If I were the one running the show, I would have told my spin doctors to shut up and instead start digging for ideas on how to save the nation from the precipice. By now, a proper government run by proper leaders ought to have already known that the reason people are being reduced to paupers who sleep on Admarc queues is not the shortage of maize but because they are too poor.
Move around and you will notice that maize is there on the market only that one has to part ways with K15,000 for a 50 kilogramme bag. To a great number of Malawians, K15,000 is no small change and they can only hope for a miracle one day to have it at once.
Earlier, I travelled to Dedza in the line of duty.
When we were departing, the man I was interviewing sent his warm regards to “my wife and kids”. He was shocked when I told him that I was unmarried and childless. He insisted on knowing why a person my age and probably on a good job is not married.
When I told him my usual answer that I do not have enough money to support a wife and children, his face became distorted with nake draw disbelief.
“Bwana mukuonekeramu simungakhale ovutika.” (You do not look like a poor man), he answered confidently.
When I asked him how much he thought I earn per month, he looked at me and said: “Inuyo thupi likuchita kuoneka kuti ndinu bwana ndipo mumalandila mwina K50,000). “The way you are looking shows that you are a boss at your work place and you receive a huge salary around K50, 000).
The lesson I learnt is that K50, 000 is a lot of money to some people that they do not even dream to ever have it. Obviously such kind of people—who we all know are in the majority in Malawi— cannot afford to buy maize at K15, 000.
All I am saying is that the hunger that is now throttling the nation is mainly because Malawians do not have money to have alternatives.
Sadly, as it stands now, it appears that we will remain in this impoverish state for the foreseeable future because those that are supposed to lead in thinking for us are either drunk, too busy fattening their bank accounts or snoring on their job.
My greatest fear is that this mad-made suffering of which Malawians have long been victims is bleeding anger and discontent among them and one day that anger will come out in a way that will tilt the foundations of this nation.
If you have noted in recent weeks, there have been too many acts of violence in a very short space. These days, greeting somebody has become an insult that calls for a fight, nowadays you can be stabbed to death by simply sneezing in public. We have just become a violent nation whose morality has decayed.
Casually, we might dismiss these recent acts of violence are normal in a society and that soon they will be gone. But what we must know is that poverty breeds discontentment and it slowly builds up until it decides to come out one way or another. One of the ways is anger that turns into violent acts like the ones we are seeing today. This recent spate of violence might be a nation harvesting its fruits of fear.
ADDENDUM: Letting the rot
The other day, I happened to be on a team of journalists who were interviewing people on the state of the economy of the country. I was shocked how most people shunned being interviewed because they were “afraid of the government.”
To them, a government is a heartless machine that grinds to pulp anyone who insinuates that it is failing. So, to be safe, one must suffer silently otherwise government will be on his neck.
I was left frustrated because this only shows the makeup of a national psyche. We have been made to be a people that are afraid of people we even elected to represent us once they go into government. What most of
us do not realise or deliberately ignore is the fact that government ought to fear its people not otherwise.
Politicians know that we are a docile nation that is why they can mess up and still want us to sing praises for them.
Recently, I was impressed by the spirit of South African people who, through their resilience have forced President Jacob Zuma to pay back money he misused on his lavish home.
Here at home we could have sat idle and stare helplessly since we are too afraid. We are even afraid of ourselves sometimes.
I am very afraid that if we continue being a nation that walks with its tail between its hind legs, then fifty years to come we will still be tossed around by politicians. In the end we will be stuck in this state of arrested development.
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