Hidden agenda enemy for progress

Under normal circumstances, each government in power aims as being more successful than the previous one.

To achieve success, the new government produces workable policies for every citizen to follow and make sure that they are on the same page with the leadership. Despite this, every government should realise that it has an opposition to deal with and watch out.

Officially, the opposition is supposed to be a watchdog for government and raise all the concerns that are likely to come up. This might be in good faith but, unfortunately, there are some people in the opposition who might have hidden agendas. It is naïve to think that everyone liked the coming in of the Tonse Alliance government.

Mostly, the opposition might be blamed for such negative thoughts because being outside government is not beneficial at all, so they might think.

In some of the more successful countries, such as Mauritius, leader of opposition in parliament can lead a government delegation to other countries. This shows that the government knows that the opposition is indeed a government-in-waiting and can be trusted not to say anything negative about government outside the country. Probably, it is such cordial relationship which has contributed to the success of Mauritius.

Further to the above, it must be said that for Malawi to be successful there must be no room for hidden agendas as a stumbling block to development.

Any Malawian, be it in government, opposition and otherwise, can be capable of creating a stumbling block. What some people do not know is that government is continuing and only administration changes hands. This fact must be accepted.

But it is only those who do not welcome any change, especially in leadership, that they promote different agendas than that of government.

Meanwhile, Malawi is now run by President Lazarus Chakwera of MCP in the Tonse Alliance. It is only natural that some people did not want the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to lose power because that was where their bread was battered.

These are some of the people in civil service and other government agencies who are not willing to follow the rules and regulations of government. By doing so they are actually sabotaging government business. There is no need for doing this, especially now that there are public reforms under Vice-President Chilima, which are aimed at reforming systems to help every Malawian regardless of any affiliation.

The Reforms are also emphasised on service delivery. If people are not well treated by a service delivery organisation, one knows where to report. In fact, fear of the unknown is no longer the case. One can remember how, during the DPP administration, people had to look over their shoulders in fear of cadets, before making any political comment.

It is strange that at this moment some people still behave as if they have never heard of reforms. Imagine, at the moment government does not allow people to cut trees from forest reserves, but some people still continue.

On his recent trip from Mzuzu to Lilongwe, Veep Chilima saw trees at Lusangazi Forest which had just been cut. He stopped and asked people who were doing that. It was clear that they did not give him convincing reasons. This is just like the illegal mining which has been taking place in the country. These miners just destroy the environment.

Having hidden agendas against a well constituted democratic government brings lack of progress.