{"id":26842,"date":"2016-06-25T08:10:51","date_gmt":"2016-06-25T06:10:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.times.mw\/?p=26842"},"modified":"2016-06-25T08:10:51","modified_gmt":"2016-06-25T06:10:51","slug":"pick-choose-i-am-with-kalindo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/2016\/06\/25\/pick-choose-i-am-with-kalindo\/","title":{"rendered":"Pick & choose: I am with Kalindo"},"content":{"rendered":"

B<\/strong>on Kalindo, a comedian turned politician has been in the news this week. Not that Kalindo\u2019s presence in the media is strange, but because he is using what he calls \u201cnew style.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Thursday, Kalindo, also known as Winiko in drama circles, mobilized a sizable crowd in the Capital City and intended to parade in his birth suit. This was his desperate attempt to demonstrate his displeasure over the killings of people with albinism.<\/p>\n

Why I endorse his decision <\/strong><\/p>\n

This is my fifth entry on the subject of killings of people with albinism. I penned my first entry when a woman with albinism was killed in Mulanje District and the country treated it just as an ordinary murder case.<\/p>\n

I have interacted with Kalindo and I know his penchant for unconventional ways of passing a message. I vividly remember how Kalindo incited people of Mulanje, Thyolo and Chiradzulu Districts to lay claim on arable land that is under commercial estates. He dramatized the whole issue declaring that \u201cine sindimanyengerera; ine sindimaomba m\u2019manja\u201d. He has a never-say-die spirit in his endevours.<\/p>\n

Kalindo is a member of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). He should be a member of its National Governing Council by virtue of being its deputy publicity secretary. The DPP is steering this country and there are reservations on how its administration is handling the issue of these murders through its agents such as the police. Probably, Kalindo tried in vain to use his platform in the DPP politburo hence closing ranks with the ordinary citizens.<\/p>\n

The vocal activist is above all, a member of Parliament. He has all the opportunity to bring the issue up in the chamber as a private member\u2019s motion. Most likely, he could have been stifled by the DPP which sponsored his ticket to the House. Hence having strangest of bed-fellows in the likes of renowned activist Billy Mayaya.<\/p>\n

Kalindo is not as mad as some quarters may think. He has also said before that in such matters, he does not follow a written script but use every means, at his disposal, to put a message across.<\/p>\n

My reservations <\/strong><\/p>\n

Despite having an ear for Kalindo, I do not think the legislator has ever been serious with his mission.<\/p>\n

When he waged a crusade to repossess land from commercial farmers, he was overwhelmed by the attention his activism attracted. He came under intense political pressure that even endangered his survival both in the DPP and the Parliament. Kalindo kept the embers alive until he met President Peter Mutharika at Sanjika Palace in Blantyre. He suddenly avoided the media and to date, he has never told the nation what transpired at the hilltop residence that sealed his lips.<\/p>\n

His change of heart in the land issue put his fellow crusader, Vincent Wandale, and their followers in a very awkward position. Kalindo\u2019s move weakened the crusade and traditional leaders preyed on the poor Wandale and his group. Of course Wandale is still peddling his message to the extent of declaring that Thyolo is \u201can independent state\u201d within Malawi, replete with its own \u201cnational flag\u201d.<\/p>\n

What is intriguing is that the DPP government has not said anything on what these sons from the Lhomwe belt have been doing. One wonders whether it is not treasonous to declare any part of the Malawi national territory a sovereign state. I can\u2019t imagine what would have visited Kamlepo Kalua or Harry Mkandawire if they made a similar declaration at Mlowe or Kafukule.<\/p>\n

My biggest question is on Kalindo\u2019s insistence on staging a nude demonstration. The dude is a lawmaker. He knows quite well that despite the numerous freedoms that Malawians enjoy, parading in the streets in one\u2019s birth suit is not one of such freedoms. By insisting that he would still march in Adam\u2019s suit, Kalindo was bent on breaking existing laws. That might not be exemplary for a law maker.<\/p>\n

As said, Kalindo has better platforms to express his disgust against the murders. Are his grounds so feeble that he could not move either his own party or the house to buy his arguments?<\/p>\n

And Kalindo is a family man and a role model to many young Malawians. Is he giving respect to his own wife and children when he exposes his frame in public just like that? What lessons is he giving to the youngsters who look up to him as a model?<\/p>\n

By dramatising the issue in the manner he has done, Kalindo is trivialising the killings of albinos. Does this not explain why everyone is coming up with all sorts of wild proposals as solutions to the murders? The other day Nkhoma Synod of the CCAP proposed that people living with albinism must be given cell phones to enable them sound SOS when in danger. Does the Synod imply that these people are so poor that they cannot afford a hand set?<\/p>\n

The other funny proposal came from students at Mzuzu University who wanted people with albinism to be given guns for self defence. I wonder what knowledge these students are imbibing at Mzuni. Should I assume that training will be arranged for these people in handling guns? Is it a fair assumption also that people with albinism are all saints that they will not use the guns in undesirable acts?<\/p>\n

Desperate times <\/strong><\/p>\n

But I would not fault Kalindo, Nkhoma Synod or indeed Mzuni students. They are doing this in good faith. There is not a clear strategy in how we want to handle this crisis as a country. One gets worried to see police officers marching against these murders instead of being busy arresting the suspects; just as Kalindo is busy presenting petitions to a fellow parliamentarian.<\/p>\n

It only shows that the citizens are desperate for solutions to this menace. So, I agree with Kalindo\u2019s initiative but have reservations with some of his approaches; which is okay in a democracy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bon Kalindo, a comedian turned politician has been in the news this week. Not that Kalindo\u2019s presence in the media is strange, but because he is using what he calls \u201cnew style.\u201d On Thursday, Kalindo, also known as Winiko in drama circles, mobilized a sizable crowd in the Capital City and intended to parade in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":25085,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26842"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26842\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26845,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26842\/revisions\/26845"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}