Instead of crisscrossing the length and breadth of the United States of America and then possibly extending the expensive foray to other exotic parts of the world, Malawi President Joyce Banda should come back home and deal with the now snowballed fallout from the shooting of Paul Mphwiyo.
Since that fateful night of September 13 when armed men attempted to end the life of the budget director, so many things—some outright defamatory to some individuals— have been flying around both in the traditional and social media.
Names have been named and shamed, fairly and unfairly. Figures that Mphwiyo was supposed to stop from being siphoned out from government coffers by corrupt individuals within the JB administration have been thrown around with merciless abandon that it is difficult to follow who is behind what and which is which.
Three people have been arrested and you would think that since the wheels of justice have begun to roll, perhaps it is time to let them run their course. Yet other questions still linger, does the police case hinge on the fact that the three acted alone and for what motive? If somebody ordered the hit, who is it and why is he or she not in the cooler with other suspects?
Again, information is flying around pointing at figures high in the echelons of the JB administration. This information flying all around us 24/7 paints a picture of financial systems that have collapsed and ill-minded individuals taking advantage to engage in a merry orgy of financial impropriety to steal from the poor taxpayer.
When a thing of such a magnitude happens, Malawians are entitled to get answers and, as I said last week, the person that has a duty to give these answers is the one they employed as a president through their vote in 2009 and she happens to be Joyce Banda.
The Mphwiyo case is patently criminal and three suspects have rightly been rounded up but is that all? Only the President can answer this question.
This is a consuming crisis by all standards and it goes straight to the core of the JB administration. Accusations are flying among Malawians that it is rotten less than two years since it took over.
I thought it was obvious for the President, first all, not to give a knee-jerk reaction she did before she left for the US, but order a probe meant to clean up the system if at all it needs that.
Just in case the President does not know, it is also her reputation that is at stake here; one she cannot afford to mess with less than 12 months before an election.
The impression being created by this crisis wrongly or rightly is that the President is presiding over a corrupt regime that has characters that are even prepared to kill to achieve their sinister intentions of defrauding the taxpayer.
Talking for a few minutes about foreign manufactured MDGs that have no chance in hell of being achieved to a half empty United Nations General Assembly auditorium was nice, just like giving talks in Texas but I really hope the President realises that her in-tray is waiting for her here back home and the first item in that tray is the Mphwiyo saga.
It cries for her attention and we, Malawians, demand answers. Is her administration rotten and who ordered Mphwiyo’s death?
