Give models a chance, Mr. President
Good people, our politicians need to be more quotable than South African legendary president Nelson Mandela or more eye-catching than Faith Chibale to appear one in 100 billboards they dominate.
For two decades, we have been walking in the shadow of the gigantic adverts with presidents’ portraits accompanied by messages or quotes that seldom occurred in their overloaded speeches.
In politics, it is not strange these billboards, even those captioned ‘Her Excellence Dr Joyce Banda—the President of the Republic of Malawi’, were still standing nearly two months after her exit from power.
Nobody loves public appearances like politicians, but a brutally peculiar thing happened in Mzuzu on Monday night when unknown operatives cut out the former president’s face from State-financed billboards.
Wasn’t there a better way of getting rid of the trite ads? Just one decent way!
I am no fan of politically erected billboards, the symbols of the Orwellian world of April 1983 where everything seemingly whispers: “Big Brother is Watching.”
However, the high-handed removal of JB’s billboards mirrors something wrong with marketing strategists who shun models and celebrities in preference for political faces.
Amid a widespread misconception that politics is the answer to all our problems, the endorsements politicians dominate are better delivered by celebs and models who appeal to people from all background.
Not that the honourable faces in high places are less good-looking than the stunning faces that add a wow factor to the billboards.
Far from it!
Political faces, both camera-friendly and ‘harsh-ish’, usually appeal to a confined crowd of their supporters. This cuts off the rest of the population.
So, this is my prayer as the incumbent Peter Mutharika is weighing whether to have his face on ads once filled by her predecessors or to cut back on this waste of state resources: “Give the Malawian model/celeb a chance, Mr. President.”
Every president’s face on a billboard conceals an impoverished Malawian star crying for a job.
But how long shall modeling and other show-them arts die malnourished because politicians want everything to be theirs?
The ending of this ‘grabiosis’ can be tragic and Mzuzu’s maimed billboards could be iconic reminders—at least for now!
James Chavula is probably one of the upcoming open talk writers, who mixes fun with business in a humourous way. I like the way he weaves through the English language as if it was his first language. He reminds me of one of my favourite feature writers, truth be told, Isaac Masingati, nor prying his trade in Nigeria. I hear they were in the same class at the Polytechnic. Bravo James!!