In the Weekend Nation of July 18 2015, the United States Ambassador Virginia Palmer informed us that her country’s Supreme Court has legalised same-sex marriages. This has raised some points which need to be discussed.
When large countries interpret human rights in a way that contradict our religious beliefs, must we people of smaller countries abandon our beliefs? The two most widely spread religions, Christianity and Islam, originated in two very small countries—Israel in the case of Christianity and Saudi Arabia for Islam. The two religions spread to other parts of the world even to bigger countries such as the United States.
In sexual relationships, it is the imperative of God or nature, to which we should submit. The story of Adam and Eve shows the genesis of genuine marriage, which often times leads to the birth of children. This is possible only if spouses are a man and a woman. Where the spouses belong to the same sex, no new life can emerge. Society may condone same sex copulation, but nature stubbornly refuses to bless such practices with birth of children. Same sex relations are unnatural.
The type of union that takes place between a man and woman on the one hand and that which takes place between a man and another man or a woman with another woman on the other hand are different things. They ought to be given different names.
From time immemorial, marriage has only referred to the special relationship between a man and a woman. If the legal system of Malawi wants to recognise same sex relations, it should give a different connotation. It is no marriage at all.
Marriage is only between a man and a woman. Let homosexuals have the rights of married couples as we legally and traditionally mean by marriage.
A term should be invented to describe same sex love. I would suggest such relations be called ‘lesodomiage’, formed out of lesbians and sodomites. Give them the rights of married couples, certificates of their own, not marriage certificates.
Just as minorities have rights, small countries have rights. Bigger countries should not use their economic muscles to force smaller countries to swallow what is unpleasant.
***
Several times, I have read that some people in north and south America are advocating the legalisation of a brain stupifying drug called marijuana or chamba. Some people in Malawi are advocating legalising the sale and smoking of Indian hemp.
In response to this, let us say what the ancient Romans would say in Latin: audialterampartem, meaning let us hear the other side. This is the side which banned the smoking and sale of chamba.
How many of us have not heard someone saying uje ndi wachamba—so and so smokes weed. This is said when someone behaves in a crazy manner. It is an admission that chamba makes people’s minds and reasoning unsound.
We know our country is very poor. But adopting short cuts to opulence often does not work. Men and women who wanted to prosper at once through money laundering are now facing the law. Those found guilty are not just sent to jail, but are having their property confiscated. When released, they will start at the bottom again.
The path to improving the Malawi economy is made up of appropriate education, savings and investments, inviting foreign direct investment and anything that involves honest hard work.
***
The news that the Alliance for Democracy (Aford) leaders have decided to introduce membership cards is both logical and timely. How else does one prove his membership of an organisation without a document.
The main advantage of issuing membership cards is that the members own the party. Democracy must begin at the party level, but democracy has a price.
Both the Nyasaland African Congress (NAC) and the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) were basically supported by membership card sales. In case of the MCP, the cards became unpopular only when they became compulsory. Let what Aford has started be emulated by other parties. When only a few people fund a political party, they own it, not the majority of members.
