Enough about conspiracies

So the president knows. That was my first thought when I listened to President Peter Mutharika’s address to the nation on the maize crisis in a tone that betrayed a man hoping his voice of anger alone could bring a suspicious nation to his side.

The least surprising aspect of his address was his belated admission to knowing about the maize crisis. Mutharika has scored many firsts in that department of procrastination on matters of national import that it has become his modus operandi.

So much has been said and written about his disastrous tenure as minister of education when he let the academic freedom saga to rumble on and on until it bored everyone else but himself to death. More could be written about his joyless stints at foreign affairs and justice ministries, but the less said about that the better.

Suffice to say that in the true fashion of a ditherer, the president did not disappoint on the maize crisis. Long after everyone else knew about the maize crisis and had resigned to fate, Mutharika delivered angry words that provided little comfort and zero hope. People expected some action, they deserved that much at the very least.

Mutharika accused some Admarc officials of “moral recklessness” for conniving with criminal maize vendors to buy maize from the marketer at night and sell it off to poor, hapless Malawians at exorbitant prices—which was quite surprising.

This, mind, is not established as fact in his statement: he has just been told, but he has instructed the police to investigate: “I have instructed the police to investigate thoroughly, and take vigorous action. If they catch you, you will go to jail. So, you better stop right away. The police will continue to monitor the situation to ensure that these culprits do not return on the scene to steal more maize.”

Is it only me or does the president sound like a mere scarecrow? Who told him? And what were the specifics of the crime, if any? His policy intervention, if it can described as such, seems to be premised on a rumour which has no supporting legs to run.

The president, however, was not done yet. Invoking JFK’s famous line—“ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country”—Mutharika improvised: “If you are as morally outraged as I am, don’t just sit and wait for what the government and police shall do for you. I want you to know that you can and must do something.”

What must we do, Mr President? Take over Admarc markets? Ransack vendors’ stalls even when their source of maize is other than Admarc?

Now, when I heard Mutharika would address the nation on Wednesday, I expected him to provide the big policy shift that would respond to the impending hunger. And when he let it be known early in his speech that some Admarc officials and vendors were “stealing” our maize, I half expected him to announce that the government had broken a cartel that had been hoarding maize.

Instead of an announcement of a big policy shift to respond to the hunger, however, our recompense were bouts of anger that I suspect disguised his own ineptitude, his helplessness.

Mr President, are you sure there is a cartel of Admarc officials and maize vendors spiriting away maize under the cover of darkness?

A story about criminal elements profiting from people’s pain would find resonance with the masses, but unfortunately, Mr President, you may have been fed one huge barroom yarn. That is not to doubt the existence of one or two rotten apples, but I don’t think the system has keeled over so much as to have become free for all.

More could be at play than the moral recklessness of Admarc officials and vendors.

I am inclined to believe Admarc chief executive officer, Felix Mlumbe, who, beside the theft myth, brought in another aspect which makes sense only because it was reflective of Admarc. Admarc, according to Mlumbe, is struggling with supply because the transporters they had contracted had opted to move humanitarian food for the World Food Programme which was paying top dollar. The few vehicles Admarc had on hand can only carry so much. That, Mr President, makes more sense than fantasies about conspiracies.

Which reminds me: Why wasn’t the opposition dragged into the maize conspiracy?