Somewhere on the planet earth, there is a village known as Maliwa. It is situated on an island.
Every five years, the people of Maliwa have an opportunity to elect their boat driver who take them to and from the land.
Some years ago, they elected their experienced boat driver popularly known as Ibu.
However, some a couple of months later, people of Maliwa changed their mind to opt for an amateur driver colloquially called Kwantere.
One day, people of Maliwa were surprised to find that the boat they were travelling in was sinking putting their lives at stake.
Who is to blame in this scenario? The people of Maliwa for making a wrong choice of an amateur boat driver? Or the experienced boat driver, Ibu, who easily gave up his hard-worn term of office? Or the amateur inexperienced boat driver who despite putting all his effort the boat kept on sinking?
This scenario is congruent with what is happening in Malawi when in 2020 Malawians made a choice to boot out Prof. Peter Mutharika in favour of Dr. Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera.
The truth of the matter is that life is about making choices. Each choice we make has its own consequences because our mother earth follows natural laws.
For instance, if you jump from the top of a 10-storey building, the law of gravity will force you down to the ground. It will not matter whether you are an atheist, a gnostic, a reverend, poor or rich, you will still need to obey the laws of nature.
Let us accept that Malawians made a formidable choice in 2020 to put Dr. Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera on the driving seat.
What this effectively means is that Malawians entrusted Dr. Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera with full responsibility to make decisions on their behalf.
Unfortunately, under the tutelage of President Chakwera, the rosy promises have turned into tribulations, mockery and nightmares.
Currently, inflation is high resulting into prices of goods and services being unaffordable.
Corruption is so rampant that President Chakwera has shown no political will to stamp out corruption by pardoning corruption convict and suspect.
Instead of a million jobs being created, many Malawian employees have been retrenched. In a nutshell, life in Malawi has become unbearable.
The question still lingers, should we blame President Chakwera for socio-economic woes Malawians are currently facing?
In my view, the first blame should go to the voter who is solely empowered to put the right people on the driving seat.
It is very pathetic that the voter has become like the complaining Israelites in the wilderness. They blamed Moses for taking them out of Egypt where they were eating freely.
Three years down the line, why have some Malawians turned into crying babies blaming the current leadership in preference to the former President Peter Mutharika? Why has Prof. Peter Mutharika become a darling to many Malawians all of a sudden.
We have not forgotten that some Malawians took to the streets to demonstrate against Prof. Peter Mutharika in 2019 citing incompetence, nepotism and high incidents of corruption.
It can therefore be argued that it appears like many Malawians don’t know what they want for their country. They are literally gullible following any direction of the wind. This is purely retrogressive.
In fact, running a government is a serious business, former President Bakili Muluzi once said. It is different from leading a church or any spiritual congregation.
Malawians were lucky because Hon Atupele Muluzi in 2020 forewarned them about President Chakwera being an amateur driver who would not take Malawians to the promised Canaan. Here we are now with crying babies realising that they have reached Bangladesh instead of Canaan.
However, President Chakwera can be forgiven as he is on the learning curve trying acquainting himself with government procedures and systems.
Imagine that President failed to reshuffle his cabinet within six months as promised. Instead, it took him over a year just to effect minor changes to the cabinet.
I have heard so many complaints that President Chakwera is falling to run the government. By the way, what is government?
Without much ado, government is composed of the Executive, the Judiciary and the Legislature.
If government is failing, then it implies that at least one arm of the government is at fault.
Much as the Executive arm of government has fallen short of the required performance standard, it can be arguably stated that other arms of government have contributed much to the dismal failure of the Tonse Alliance administration.
Yes, we have seen the Head of state practicing nepotism. He also promoted corruption by pardoning corruption convict, Uladi Mussa and corruption suspect, Bakili Muluzi.
As a leader, President Chakwera is slow at making crucial decisions. An example is that there was a time when it took him a long time to fire corruption suspects such as Newton Kambala and Kezzie Msukwa from his cabinet.
The other arm of government is the legislature which is composed of members of Parliament from political parties.
It is pathetic that the Speaker of the National Assembly became so partisan that she participated in the election of the leader of opposition.
No wonder the office of the leader of opposition is compromised. One example of such misdemeanour was the expeditious passing of the 2023 National budget within 120 minutes with no proper scrutiny.
In fact, the opposition side in parliament is dismally weak. This has consequently contributed to the total failure of Tonse Alliance administration.
It is widely accepted that a strong opposition party in parliament provides the necessary checks and balances on the other arms of government.
The Judiciary has recently become biased and unfair.
For instance, it is protecting corruption suspects such as Kezzie Msukwa from being investigated and prosecuted by the Anti-Corruption Bureau.
In conclusion, much as the voter is the first to blame for putting the failed Tonse Alliance into power, the three arms of government also have failed to provide checks and balances on each other.
