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M’mbelwa or Mzimba District Council?

We are in 2016. Christians and other peaceful religious groupings will tell you that it is just by the grace of God, Jah, Chiuta or Allah that we are here today. That we are here while our many relatives, and even friends died in the past year is evidence that God Almighty has been on our side, they will argue. However, scientists, genuine scientists—not these around us who keep parroting what others have already found or failed to find—will tell you that we are here because the earth, our Major One home, has naturally completed its annual ritual of orbiting or revolving around the sun and from January 1 (yesterday), it has commenced another revolution like it has done for millions, if not billions of years.

As King Solomon, our favourite ancient Jewish existentialist, put it some 3 000 years ago, there is nothing new about a year ending and another one beginning (Read Ecclesiastes 1: 1-18 again). Thus, this New Year deserves no celebration, no dancing, no merriment, no ululation, no whistling, no tintinnabulation, no praise, and no condemnation.

Nonetheless, we, Sheikh Jean-Philippe LePoisson, SC (RTD), Abiti Joyce Befu, MG 66, Mzee Most Paramount (MP) Native Authority Mandela, and I, the Mohashoi, wish Happy and Productive 2016 to the President of the Republic of Malawi, Arthur Peter, sorry, Peter Arthur Mutharika, the First Lady, the Vice-President, the Second Lady, Cabinet Ministers, members of Parliament, the Commander of the Malawi Defence Force and all soldiers, the Inspector General of the Malawi Police Service (MPS) and all officers, teachers in genuine universities, in specialist colleges, in secondary schools, in jando, in nyau and in all other religious-cum-education institutions, herbalists and the political opposition.

Let’s take time and ask ourselves what we need to do better for the improvement of our fatherland, our beloved country, Malawi. Let’s take time and ask ourselves why the economy is gone to the hungry dogs; why our internal security is slipping through our hands. Maybe it is time the Malawi Police stopped being a service and reverted to doing the real job of protecting the citizenry non-nonsensically. Maybe it is time the economists— hopefully we still have some around—started talking less and helping the government more with policies and ideas that will help our economy.

We are not economists and we don’t aspire to be. But, surely, Malawi can export a lot of things and make money to support our currency. For example, the College of Medicine is producing top-notch medical doctors annually. Why don’t we make arrangements with countries that need such doctors so that they absorb them in exchange for some national income? Cuba did the same and survived US sanctions for 50-some years. Why don’t we go back to our 2002 tourism development plan and make Malawi a must-visit country for international tourists? Why have we, as a nation, stopped thinking and offering progressive ideas, instead of specialising in fault-finding sans cesse?

To start off the year 2016, we have a question, which you must help us to answer: What is the name of that vast district in the Northern Region, the one overzealous MP once declared as an independent kingdom within Malawi? Correct.

All along we have known it as Mzimba. The Atlas of Malawi still shows that it is called Mzimba. However, for some years now, it has been referred to as M’mbelwa replacing Mzimba slowly. The Midnight Election Commission (MEC) has constituencies in M’mbelwa and not Mzimba; the Local Development Fund disburses funds to M’mbelwa and not Mzimba District Council. Mzuzu, a city shared by Nkhata Bay and Mzimba is unilaterally declared to be in M’mbelwa. Kunjani?

If this change has been sanctioned by the Malawi Government, then we should be formally informed. We, therefore, propose that we also rename the Republic of Mulanje-Thyolo-Phalombe Ngolongoliwa District Council; Karonga and Chitipa should be called Kyungu District Council, and, of course, Dedza-Ntcheu-Mwanza should be renamed Gomani District Council. n  Feedback: bottomup2012@gmail.com, http://levimanda.blospot.com, +265998132702(sms only)

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