That was a non event
As a journalist that has been in this business now for 14 years, it has always been drummed into me to be objective and impartial when dealing with news and news sources all times.
Yet, I must say, it is not always easy as it sounds. Take the treatment of all political parties as a news value, a difficult venture knowing that they are over thirty of them in our books.
Is the ruling DPP, for example, the same as James Nyondo’s Nasaf? Should events organised by the two be given equal resources for coverage when the context is hundreds of miles apart?
It is catch 22 and it came into sharp focus during the run up to the election. I know for a fact that Antony Kasunda’s Misa Malawi had to sweat blood just to decide who to feature in the presidential debates.
The choice was to be realistic and feature four top presidential candidates that had a chance of making it at the polls or pretend not to be picky and choosy on behalf of Malawians by including all the 12 candidates even though some of them knew pretty well that they had no chance in hell of making it into the State House. We know what happened and that is they all bulldozed their way into the debate just to appear on TV when they knew that they are utterly non electable.
But Malawians had their say on May 20 and clearly cut the chaff to quote Ephraim Munthali. Now the million dollar questions are: Should the chaff continue bothering Malawians by churning out more of the chaff? Should the media continue pandering to the whims of the chaff when it is clear that they are a non event and non entity on our political landscape?
Consider the New Labour Party (NLP) whose leader Friday Jumbe announced its dissolution this week with a pack of lies and unfounded assumptions.
To me the announcement did not even merit the newspaper space or the airtime it enjoyed on radios and TVs for the mere reason that it was a non event that has no bearing in the lives of busy Malawians.
The party had no significant membership both in Jumbe’s constituency and countrywide that it must have been embarrassing to him.
But Jumbe had the audacity to lie with a straight face that he is dissolving the party because what it promised Malawians is being implemented by the ruling DPP without telling us what exactly he promised.
Then he goes on to ask members of NLP to join DPP. Which members and where are they? No wonder there is a deathly silence from DPP because the only thing they would tell Jumbe is that this is utter nonsense and empty posturing and that there is nothing to be gained from this whole enterprise.
Jumbe deserves from DPP the same response that Kondwani Nankhumwa gave Ken Zikhale Ng’oma when he announced that he was joining DPP: Sorry we are not interested.
Nankhumwa might even add to Jumbe, for a good measure, that there was, in fact, no tangible NLP and, therefore, no members to join DPP: Don’t bother us with emptiness, Mr. Jumbe.
Which leads me to my earlier take: Should the media in Malawi continue to waste newspaper space or airtime on seemingly non events that have no impact on the lives of Malawians?
Why should Malawians give a hoot about a party that is a non entity?
