Defy the Tonse are liars tag
June 17, 2018
Time flies! Next Wednesday, Malawi will clock a year since they voted in a Fresh Presidential Election (FPE) after the courts nullified the elections that were tippexed and irregular. The outcome saw the rise to power of Malawi Congress Party (MCP) President Lazarus Chakwera and his UTM Party partner Saulos Chilima.
It’s been a year of the Tonse Alliance, and the leaders of the nine parties met in Mangochi during the week to look at the year ending.
One year later, it appears the DPP is not yet ready to accept that the focus should, by now, be on 2025. It is their right to seek legal redress on whether the Tonse Alliance tenure is legitimate or not, but I see the dog barking at the wrong moon because for now, the party should have been concentrating on rebuilding.
The Tonse Alliance, as well has to do its own soul-searching as they clock one year in power. Is what they promised during the campaign period anywhere near what is happening on the ground? Granted, they can’t fulfill all the promises they made in a year but is the alliance going in the right direction?
In as far as the political barometer is concerned, the Tonse Alliance is basically the MCP and the UTM Party, not necessarily a consortium of nine parties. These are the two parties Malawians will remember for not only ousting the DPP, but also for promising free water and electricity, passports at K14 000, an allowance for the elderly and a host of other promises.
It has been a year of a seeming cold war between the two bed-fellows. There have been silent jabs on who really calls the shots. These are blows that may result in their losing focus on the dream to take Malawians to the land of milk and honey.
One year on, the belief was that corruption would be history, but that remains a pipe-dream. It is clear that some functionaries close to the ruling elite have been involved in alleged corrupt practices, but they have been left scot-free. Some of the names mentioned in the audit of the Covid-19 funds show you the idea of sacred cows is not gone.
The mistake the two parties can make at the moment is to take Malawians for granted. This is the mistake other parties kissed Malawi goodbye. Promising one thing and delivering the opposite is the absolute slap in the face.
The two parties’ unity was born from demonstrations of Malawians as they awaited the Constitutional Court ruling. Before the polls on May 21, 2019, the two parties were like parallel lines that would never meet. It was the will of Malawians to see the two unite.
Tonse must prove itself as a holy alliance not a get-together of liars.
While we are at it, there have been demonstrations organised by the Centre for Democracy and Economic Development Initiatine (Cdedi) in Thyolo and Mulanje over the issue of land. Both Chakwera and Chilima during the campaign trail promised the people that they would sort out the land issue there. Yet, today the issue refuses to die. It remains unresolved.
The demonstrations show that where people feel they were cheated with promises, they turn to the streets. They have every reason to wonder how foreigners bought big chunks of land, when they were squeezed into unfertile lands.
Chilima and Chakwera during the campaign agreed Vincent Wandale’s facts on land alienation were ideal, not the means he was seeking to attain that end.
In 2004 or thereabouts, there was the Community-based Land Reform Programme (CBLRP), popularly known as Kudzigulira Malo. People from Thyolo and Mulanje were sponsored to get land in Machinga and Mangochi. But, most of the people returned to their original homes, as there were no amenities there. Questions arise how it had to take foreign entities to try and solve a problem they are part of by creating another problem.
The villagers of Thyolo and Mulanje have all their right to demand their rightful land. At best, the allies can explain when the leaseholds for the estates expire.
