Masiteni’s People’s Party may have fared badly during last year’s elections after those 2 years that she ruled our country courtesy of fate but her reign was not uneventful.
Masiteni, with her PP, is credited to have breathed life into a country that was almost collapsing according to some observers. DPP faithful’s believe the fallen Goliati giant would have resuscitated the economy!
Whether Bingu would have worked some corners to bail us out of the crisis he left us in remains in the classified section of the savage death which found it befitting to intervene.
But one thing that stands out of PP’s regime to those that advocate for good democratic principles like Yours Truly, is the resignation of PP’s secretary general in May 2013.
To refresh your memories, Henry Chibwana was the SG of the orange party. As CEO of PP he presided over a meeting in Lilongwe to welcome one Fredrick Kamwangala and Agnes Penemulungu into the PP fold.
This is the time that members of parliament were flocking to PP in masses prompting the excited SG to comment that ‘it was possible that the whole Malawi can turn into orange’ implying that Malawi was better off as a one party state since the new girl in town was drawing the attention of all drooling suitors.
His statement received censure from the British envoy and criticism from a lot of sections of the society. But if truth be told, we knew in our hearts of hearts that the CEO was just being overzealous. It was not going to be possible that his words were going to translate into our drifting into a single party state.
But honorable Chibwana shocked even those that demanded his resignation when he threw in the towel. The gentleman knew that the statement he made did not put his PP in tandem with democratic ideals. And his party disowned his statement!
Now, we have one Gerald Viola whose duty is to speak for the president. The author of a letter that is ‘pleading’ with government departments to advertise with Galaxy radio which is owned by Mutharika.
Yours truly is well informed of the motivation behind Mr Viola’s actions which are purely selfish and personal. A confidant at Galaxy claims he still gets a cut at galaxy. He knows he cannot be accused of receiving money from Galaxy which is a private entity while enjoying the tax payers’ salary.
Well, I wouldn’t have had any problem with that if Mr Viola did not drag our dear president to advance his selfish motives. His action has put the name of the president in disrepute. It is graver than Chibwana reason for throwing in the towel.
To me, Chibwana was just caught in his fantasy world. Our president has a lot on his table and that does not include covering up mistakes of an aide. I hope Gerald will realised that, without waiting to be fired, this calls for his ability to know when to resign…
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of The Maravi Post
