I very much doubt that our president, His Excellency Professor Peter Mutharika lives in Malawi. Sometimes I have a sense that he is still in the US and sometimes I have a feeling that he is in Pluto. As a leader and Chancellor of our prestigious University of Malawi, I expected him to break his silence and say something about the impasse on university fee hike.
As a leader, he should not be pushed by college student union leaders who have sought an audience with him on Thursday. We, in the Fees Must Fall campaign sympathisers, are not against the raising of the fees per se but the timing is very bad, inconsiderate and smacks of selfishness on our few elite.
The cost of life in Malawi has drastically gone up, the economy is at its worst since Malawi was created, our leaders seem not to know what to do, instead they keep on slapping us with one tax after another. The party cadets controlled at Kamuzu Palace seem to enjoy to terrorise those with dessenting views.
Yet most of them were not there on that chilly mid month June 14 referendum day, either they were too small to vote or were in exile, when we voted for this democracy in 1993. They have now taken Mutharika as their god. They would do anything to appease and please their stomachs. This meeting of the student union leaders and the president is useless and senseless.
The students should go ahead with their non violent cause. There is a disconnect between the president and his people. If he was considerate, the president, as the Chancellor of the University of Malawi, would have advised the university to raise the fees gradually not at one go as they have done it in these harsh economic conditions.
It is a fact that most of Malawians are in abject poverty, very few of us have the luxury of disposable income. Fees Must Fall indeed until the economy improves!
Foolish argument. There will never be a good time to raise fees. People will want money all the time.