Tonse Alliance avoids addressing critical issues

Tonse Alliance partners, a grouping of nine parties in government on Friday ‘avoided’ critical issues, including an agreement between President Lazarus Chakwera and his Vice-President, Saulos Chilima, but made little efforts to discuss the economy and corruption.

However, the four-hour meeting that ended around 8pm, centred much on unity in the alliance as some partners felt the relationship was being taken for granted with little discussion on the rising cost of living and corruption, Nation on Sunday has learnt.

While the alliance spokesperson Kamuzu Chibambo said the meetings are ongoing, political analysts feel this was a lost opportunity to address the suffering of Malawians.

In a statement yesterday, Chibambo, who is also president of People’s Transformation Party, showed the discussion centred on unity in the alliance.

He said: “The alliance partners will uphold and abide by the alliance and continue to work together for the good of the Malawian people; the alliance partners will continue to fulfill their pledge to focus on faithfully addressing the socio-economic challenges the Malawian people are facing.

“The alliance partners will intensify their periodic meetings with immediate effect and do their utmost to safeguard the alliance by promoting and undertaking all necessary actions and interventions for strengthening the bond of cooperation among and between them.”

In an interview yesterday, Chibambo said the four-hours was not enough to discuss all things, including the agreement between Chakwera and Chilima.

However, he said the better part of the meeting discussed the existence of the alliance where members interrogated each other on whether the pact was still intact as they have not met recently.

He argued: “We haven’t met for too long and these other issues on the agreement will be discussed during other meetings soon. But members expressed themselves fully because we thought a relationship [alliance] should not be taken for granted.

“Of course, on other issues like corruption and cost of living, the President made a presentation. He spoke highly against corruption and all members discussed that. Let people understand that these are deep meetings where people speak out. We don’t just scratch on issues; we go into details. We will be getting back to the nation soon.”

But Political and Administrative Studies lecturer at University of Malawi (Unima) Associate Professor Mustafa Hussein feels the partners lost an opportunity to deal with the bigger issue of agreement.

He said: “From the word go, the issue of the agreement should not have been a secret because we are in a democracy and the key word is transparency. It is important that not only the members, but the nation should know about any agreement. These matters affect Malawians; it should not be treated as a privilege, but a right for people to know.

“These are troubled times, especially on issues of corruption [allegations] that have even affected Chilima. So, it was important for them to meet. They should adopt good corporate governance tactics, where their spokespersons explain to people after the meetings what the government has put in place to deal with corruption or rising cost of living.”