Chakwera told the basics

Malawi’s opposition leader Lazarus Chakwera has come under fire for what has been christened as taking an archaic approach to politics by sustaining attacks on the current government.

The Malawi Watch has made the observation in a press statement released on 15th November 2017.

This comes hot on the heels of the Malawi Congress Party’s (MCP) response to the address made by President Peter Mutharika in Parliament a few weeks ago.

The Malawi Watch wonders why the opposition leader keeps on railing at the government on several issues.

The NGO says Chakwera has demonstrated hatred over the current government through the tone of his speeches. The statement adds that the MCP is playing archaic politics by showing it believes that by being in the opposition, then it is meant to oppose everything that government does.

‘’The content, language and tone of his statement demonstrate his limited understanding of the role of the opposition. It shows that he believes that the opposition, as the name suggests, is limited to opposing everything or anything the party in power or the government proposes. Worse still, it shows that he believes that resorting to personal attacks and uncivilized language are what an opposition is all about. Chakwera has once again shown his political immaturity as characterized by emotional outbursts and derogatory language by making criticisms which some commentators have already branded as one dimensional,’’ reads part of the statement signed by Executive Director Billy Katimba Banda.

‘’Unlike mature opposition politicians elsewhere who would highlight achievements and positives of the government before criticising and offering solutions to prevailing challenges, Chakwera thinks and believes that his role is simply to be negative about everything that the government is doing. We, at Malawi Watch, would like to condemn in the strongest terms the behaviour of using derogatory vilification of rival politicians, let alone by a man who calls himself reverend and from whom decorum is expected.’’

It adds: ‘’By concentrating on insulting the President, Hon Chakwera has simply validated the perceptions of many Malawians – that the Leader of Opposition is a bitter and failed politician who has no clue of solving the country’s problems if he were given an opportunity to rule this country.

“A mature opposition leader is the one who is able to criticize and at the same time offer possible solutions to the problems under discussion. For all we know, Malawians are no longer interested with the outdated politics of using podiums including the floor of the National Assembly as a forum for showing how pejorative one is. Malawians want politicians who accept problems and move in to start solving the problems as the current government is doing,’’ the statement says.

The verbal wars between the MCP and DPP camps have been one of the core political news that has dominated the headlines lately.

The MCP recently beat the DPP in a byelection by amassing 5 seats of the posts contested for against the single one the DPP got.

President Mutharika is on record as having said that he wants the MCP to show its political prowess by taking him out of power in the 2019 elections.

On its part, the MCP maintains the DPP regimes has failed to run the current citing the rising cases of corruption in government, the ongoing power blackouts and the ‘declining’ economy which the DPP on the other hand claims is taking good shape.

Analysts told Malawi24 recently that the verbal wars between these two main parties lightly sets the scenery of how contention to the 2019 polls will be like.

The two parties have however been advised to do ‘decent’ politics to avoid seeing Malawi having a disrupted poll that has a potential of darkening the countries democracy.