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Malawi: Hope in a New Start
AfricaFocus Bulletin
Apr 19, 2012 (120419)
(Reposted from sources cited below)
Editor's Note
Supporters of democracy and women's rights have good reason
to celebrate the peaceful succession in Malawi, in which
Vice-President Joyce Banda took office despite fears that
she might be blocked by associates of President Bingu wa
Mutharika after his unexpected death. The country faces a
multitude of structural problems, including donor dependency
and the role of tobacco, a major threat to global public
health, as the leading export. But for now the mood is
optimistic. Malawians as well as outside observers say the
country is ready for a new start.
The new president is not only the first woman head of state
in Southern Africa, and the second on the continent, but
someone with a distinguished history of civil society
activism as well as having served in several government
posts since 2004, including the post of vice-president since
2009. She was excluded from government office by President
Mutharika in December 2010, but retained her constitutional
position as vice-president.
This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains several articles with
commentary on the current developments and relevant
background. The first is an article by Diana Cammack which
appeared in the Guardian's Povery Matters blog last week,
with a short update provided for AfricaFocus yesterday by
the author.
Also included are an interview by AllAfrica.com with then
Vice-President Joyce Banda from September last year, and a
commentary by Gwinyai A. Dzinesa and Cheryl Hendricks of
the Institute for Security Studies in South Africa.
Additional current commentary:
"Banda Gives New Lease on Life to Malawi," by Claire Ngozo
Inter Press Service, Apr 15, 2012
http://ipsnews.net/text/news.asp?idnews=107435
"Who are the 'honourable' - MPs or citizens?," by Fletcher
Tembo
ODI Blog Posts, 17 April 2012
http://tinyurl.com/7ec54sk
Additional background analysis of 2011 crisis:
"Malawi Risks Becoming 'Fragile State,'" by Diana Cammack
Guardian Poverty Matters Blog, Nov 17, 2011
http://tinyurl.com/6vhl4tk (includes links to a longer
analytical report)
For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on Malawi, visit
http://www.africafocus.org/country/malawi.php Of particular
interest is a report from July 2011, at
http://www.africafocus.org/docs11/mal1107.php
++++++++++++++++++++++end editor's note+++++++++++++++++
How democracy came through in Malawi's succession
When Malawi's president died, the danger arose that
constitutional succession would be subverted. But civil
society and an astute vice-president made sure that didn't
happen
Diana Cammack, April 11, 2012
Guardian Povery Matters Blog
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters
Direct url: http://tinyurl.com/7a29mcs
[Diana Cammack is a research associate of the Overseas
Development Institute (ODI, http://www.odi.org.uk) and head
of the local governance & leadership stream of the Africa
Power and Politics Programme (APPP; http://www.institutions-africa.org).]
Malawi narrowly escaped another convulsion last week when it
took more than 48 hours for Vice-President Joyce Banda to be
formally recognised as the new president, as mandated in the
country's constitution, after the sudden death of Bingu wa
Mutharika.
Details of Mutharika's death remain scanty, as intended by
his associates. Last Thursday, he was meeting with an MP
from the ruling Democratic Progressive party (DPP) when he
collapsed. He was taken to Kamuzu central hospital in
Lilongwe, and some reports say he was dead on arrival.
Since 2009, Mutharika's efforts to ensure that his brother
Peter and the DPP win the 2014 elections has dominated
Malawi's politics. He had chosen Banda as his own running
mate in 2009 because she could win in the rural areas. By
promoting women's rights, education and business when in and
out of government, Banda had gained a large following.
However, Mutharika ostracised her as soon as the elections
were won, fearing she had presidential ambitions.
Eventually, she was expelled from the DPP and formed her own
People's party (PP).
Mutharika sought to crush all opposition by arresting and
attacking outspoken critics and to stifle popular outrage
with the failing economy by putting down demonstrations.
His obstinate refusal to float the kwacha, Malawi's
currency, resulted in it being overvalued in April by 80% --
and it brought a shortage of foreign exchange in the banking
system. Mutharika's "zero-deficit budget" and a reduced
reliance on western aid pushed Malawi into an economic
crisis - with petrol shortages, power cuts, business
closures, and rising prices and unemployment.
He told western donors "to go to hell" after expelling the
British high commissioner several months ago. While the
Chinese built new edifices, the old infrastructure
deteriorated for lack of funds for maintenance. Key
government contracts awarded without open tendering became
the order of the day, while questions about Mutharika's
rapid accumulation of wealth were raised by civil society, .
On the president's death, the DPP, seeking time to figure
out how to halt Banda's succession, made no announcement,
and sent his body to Johannesburg. But rumours began to
spread that the president was dead. However, the state
broadcaster, MBC, continued its regular programmes so the
news could not easily reach the rural areas.
Meanwhile, the cabinet and Mutharika's close associates met
secretly in Lilongwe. Some were adamant that Banda could not
be allowed to take power. They apparently considered making
the newly appointed DPP leader, Peter Mutharika, prime
minister (leaving Banda as ceremonial president), while
others suggested appointing a new president and vicepresident
from the DPP and bypassing her altogether.
By last Friday, civil society leaders were becoming restive.
They held a press conference, and said Malawians would not
stand for anything other than a constitutionally mandated
succession. Banda's residence was being guarded by the army.
Former president Bakili Muluzi and former vice-president
Justin Malewezi called for calm.
The problem was that no formal announcement of Mutharika's
death had yet been made, and his body had been spirited
away. But Banda outflanked the plotters by asking the South
African government to notify her formally of Mutharika's
health.
Only when she heard from Pretoria did she make her move. By
then civil society, the army, aid donors and others had made
it clear they supported the constitutional succession. The
plotters made one last foolish move: five senior DPP
officials appeared on television to tell citizens not listen
to anyone but them.
Last Saturday, Banda went on air to offer condolences to
Mutharika's family and declare a 10-day mourning period. The
office of the president and cabinet finally announced
Mutharika had died. Later that day Banda went to parliament
to take the oath of office, more than two days after
Mutharika's death. By then, mass "defections" by DPP MPs to
the PP were being reported.
Last Sunday, Banda replaced the chief of police, Peter
Mukhito. The new chief, Lot Dzonzi, is known to be a human
rights advocate. Other key changes -- at the Treasury, the
reserve bank, the ministry of information and the MBC -- soon
followed.
Banda is expected to reverse many of Mutharika's fiscal
policies, which will allow the IMF to renew aid, and for
other donors to follow. The kwacha is likely to be floated,
and donors have promised to help combat the impact of
devaluation on the poor. In due course, these changes should
alleviate foreign exchange and fuel-shortages and get
businesses and people back to work.
Update added for AfricaFocus Bulletin, Apr 18, 2012
Malawi is currently undergoing an extended period of
mourning as Mutharika's body is taken around the three major
cities for people to view it. Indicative of the confusion
that surrounds his demise is the changing date of his death
painted on the white cross that accompanies the coffin
(http://tinyurl.com/73p3t3k). The date is still not right if
we are to believe he was dead when he left the hospital on
the 5th as doctors state. The date of his death is important
because the DPP, including those who plotted what has come
to be known as the 'silent coup', will lead the formal
opposition in parliament. Thus far government has shown no
signs of prosecuting those who sought to put aside the
Constitution and replace Joyce Banda with Mutharika's
brother Peter, though a private citizen is threatening a law
suit charging several senior DPP officials with sedition and
threatening the peace.
Meanwhile Joyce Banda has focused on governing. She has
inherited a country in crisis, and started by making changes
in key areas - appointing new heads of the police and the
state media (MBC) and a new attorney general. She has met
key donors who have promised to help Malawi (and especially
the poor as prices rise) if she does what Mutharika refused
to do - devalue the kwacha. In the medium term this ought to
improve the nation's creditworthiness and the importation of
fuel, and to restart business, commerce and hiring. A
tobacco company manager deported by Mutharika has been
readmitted to Malawi, and there is reason to believe the
British will soon send a new High Commissioner (as the old
one was declared persona non grata by Mutharika). Agreement
between government and the IMF on a programme of macroeconomic
reform will go some way towards meeting the
prerequisites of western donors. In addition the repeal of
Mutharika's repressive legislation should see their renewal
of general budget support.
Meanwhile South Africa and Zambia have promised to help
relieve the immediate fuel crisis, which should help reduce
public tension. Civil society activists are calling for the
'twenty demands' made of Mutharika in July 2011 to be
addressed first, and for a commission to be established to
investigate the mysterious death (and cover-up by the
police) of the student leader Chasowa. Joyce Banda --the
daughter of an army officer, wife of a retired chief
justice, a women's rights activist, and a former minister of
foreign affairs -- has inherited significant national and
international good will. In this period before Mutharika is
buried she has already started to secure some quick wins.
Malawi: How Vice-President Joyce Banda Fell Out With
President Mutharika
6 April 2012
Interview by AllAfrica.com
http://allafrica.com/stories/201204061145.html
Malawi's Vice-President Joyce Banda gave her view of the
deterioration of her relationship with President Bingu wa
Mutharika in an interview with AllAfrica last September. She
told Trevor Ballantyne and Bunmi Oloruntoba that part of the
problem was Banda's desire to promote the candidacy of his
brother, and the foreign minister, Peter Mutharika, as his
successor:
The genesis of what is going on in Malawi as far as I am
concerned starts out with the succession process. We got in
this time, the president asked me to stand with him...
[President Mutharika's] promise to the people was, 'I am
going to make Joyce Banda my vice-president.' Because I am a
women's rights activist, he courted the Malawi women to his
side. He said, 'I'll send her back to you with
responsibilities that she is passionate about,' things like
maternal health... and 70 percent of the people who voted
were women.
So we go into the government and two weeks later he
announces the first cabinet.....and I am not there. There
were two vice-presidents before me [who] had portfolios
Straight away announcements came out on the radio from
people that were frustrated and felt like they had been
betrayed: 'Mr. President you have let us down, we voted for
you because of her, you have not fulfilled your part of the
deal.'
But then when he... started saying... my brother can stand,
he is Malawian, they said, 'This is about your brother,' and
straight away the people said to him, 'Then your candidate
is your brother, our candidate will be Joyce Banda.' So
people started taking sides. All the chiefs, everybody
started coming into the conversation. I was ridiculed,
castigated.
What started to happen was my ratings went up and his
ratings went down. Then the president got even more alert
about that, so to cut a long story short, he diverted from
his agenda. The whole government now, instead of focusing on
promises like, 'we should do this, we shall bring water, we
shall empower the youth,' that didn't happen. The president
is focused on this succession process, 'who is talking about
this and that? Who is not on my side? Who is on Joyce
Banda's side?'
At the end of the day, the economy got so bad, the basic
needs of the people started to go: no water, no electricity,
no medicines in the hospital. And as all that is happening,
then he started passing laws... For example... where a
minister has the power to ban a newspaper that says anything
against him that he doesn't like...
He insisted that I endorse his brother because everyone had
to endorse his brother. And I said, 'No, Mr. president I
don't think this is a good idea, we haven't even started
working, this is only our second year [in power].' So he
gave me two weeks: 'You either endorse or you will be
expelled from the party.'
At that point there was an attempt on my life, and
fortunately for me I had switched cars, and they hit the car
that I was supposed to be in. Up until now the president has
refused to set up a commission of inquiry to find out who
was going to kill me; I haven't seen a police report.
When two weeks elapsed, I was called and I was expelled from
the party. He said you cannot belong to the party and I was
vice-president of the party. Unfortunately, for him, he
couldn't sack me [as vice-president of the country]. The
people in the country said, 'No you cannot sack her, and for
your information we are going to support her.' So after I
left, Malawians formed what they call 'Friends of Joyce
Banda' [which] grew and grew and grew.
I did a survey and I asked what should I do? And 85 percent
said you form a party, don't join another party. What you
must know is that ever since 1984 there is no vice-president
that started with a president when he was elected into
office and finished with that president. Somewhere things go
wrong...
[When Malawians planned protests in July 2011 and Mutharika
announced counter-demonstrations]... I wrote him and said,
Mr. president I am begging you, don't bring bloodshed in
Malawi, don't start that, don't do it. We are the last
persons to do that, because you and I have taken an oath to
protect the same Malawians you are fighting with on the
streets!
And side by side that I issued a press statement, I said,
Mr. President allow them to march, Malawians march with
responsibility, police protect everybody, and I am asking
the president to sit down with organizers... So on the 21st
of July... they shot 20 people and that's when he got upset
because now he thought people would stop protesting. At the
end of the day [Mutharika] cited seven names of those he
would 'smoke out'. It included Joyce Banda and two others
who had their houses torched, one of them was Rafiq Hajat.
The government was still in talks when I left [Malawi to
come to the U.S.] but I do not know what the outcome is. So,
please pray for us.
'Sleepy Malawi' Makes Political Waves - Joyce Banda As the
First Woman President in Southern Africa
by Gwinyai A. Dzinesa and Cheryl Hendricks, 17 April 2012
Institute for Security Studies, South Africa
http://www.iss.co.za/
Gwinyai A. Dzinesa is senior researcher in conflict
prevention and risk analysis and Cheryl Hendricks is senior
research fellow in Conflict Management and Peacebuilding.
http://allafrica.com/stories/201204170996.html
If women activists are excited, it is because this
represents progress in Southern Africa as we ebb closer to
2015, in which 50% of women should be in decision-making
positions according to the SADC Protocol on Gender and
Development.
But, who is Joyce Banda and what are the political trials
that await her as she assumes power? Her ascendance to this
position is in itself representative of a larger struggle in
Malawi between those supporting a good governance and human
rights agenda (largely civil society) and those who have
been aligned to the increasingly autocratic modus operandi
of the late Mutharika.
Banda, among her many other identities, is a gender
activist, educationist and politician. She founded, among
others, the Joyce Banda Foundation for Better Education, the
Young Women Leaders Network, the National Association of
Business Women and the Hunger Project in Malawi and has
received much acclaim and recognition for these
achievements. She has been an outspoken advocate for women's
leadership and women's empowerment and was voted 'Woman of
the Year' in Malawi in 1997 and 1998. But it was her rise in
the Malawian political landscape that would place her as one
of top women leaders in Africa.
Banda occupied the positions of Minister of Gender, Child
Welfare and Community Services and Minister of Foreign
Affairs between 2004 and 2009. In May 2009 she was elected
Vice President, a position that then ignited gender-based
power struggles within the party. The succession struggle
within the ruling Democratic People's Party (DPP) saw highranking
officials asserting that 'Malawi is not ready for a
woman president' and Mutharika himself proclaiming his
brother, Peter Mutharika, as his successor. These events
also represented the beginning of a rapid decline in Malawi
with many fearing that it would tread the same path as its
previously recalcitrant neighbour, Zimbabwe.
In December 2010 Banda was fired from the DPP. The fact that
she was elected made it constitutionally difficult for
Mutharika to strip her of the position of Vice President though
he certainly succeeded in politically marginalizing
her. In 2011, she formed her own party, The Peoples Party.
Banda retained the same support that propelled her into
power, namely civil society (especially women's groups), as
she stood fast in her critique of what was perceived as the
growing dictatorial tendencies of Mutharika and a fastdeclining
economy.
Mutharika had been re-elected president in 2009 with a
sweeping 66% of the vote. This flowed from a generally
successful first term during which he was seen as a reformer
and in which he had managed to increase Malawi's
agricultural output significantly through an input subsidy
scheme. However, analysts argue that having earlier freed
himself from the shadow of his patron, former president
Bakili Muluzi, Mutharika became intoxicated by the acclaim
brought by the success of his agricultural policy. The selfproclaimed
all-knowing 'economist-in-chief' soon began to
show autocratic and eccentric streaks. Since 2010, Mutharika
faced growing criticism locally and internationally for
authoritarianism, trampling on democratic freedoms, human
rights abuses and presiding over the collapse of Malawi's
economy.
In an unprecedented move Mutharika expelled Fergus CochraneDyet,
the British High Commissioner in Lilongwe, after the
diplomat noted in a leaked cable to London that Mutharika
was becoming 'ever more autocratic and intolerant of
criticism'. Britain, Malawi's largest bilateral aid donor,
responded with a tit-for-tat ejection of Malawi's High
Commissioner from London and withdrawing aid.
Meanwhile, Malawi suffered a burgeoning economic crisis
fuelled by among others the severance of donor support and a
decline in key exports - especially agricultural goods such
as tobacco, which accounted for up to 80% of foreign
exchange earnings. Malawi's inflation rose rapidly to double
figures, pushing higher the cost of living in a country
where over 70% of the population of 15.4 million people live
on less than $1 a day. A general shortage of foreign
exchange affected the government's ability to pay for the
import of food, fuel and medicines, resulting in major
shortages.
The deteriorating political and economic conditions sparked
anti-government demonstrations in Blantyre and Lilongwe last
July. 19 people were killed in a ruthless police crackdown
to quell the protests, prompting SADC to place Malawi on the
summit agenda. Led by Britain, international donors
cancelled their aid, citing concerns about the infringement
of democratic freedoms, economic mismanagement and bad
governance. This caused the economic crisis to worsen since
external resources had been funding around 40% of the
country's national budget.
Until his death Mutharika, a former World Bank economist,
publicly disagreed with the West and the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) over economic policy, particularly over
the devaluation of Malawi's currency.
He argued that devaluing the Kwacha would hurt the poor.
This prolonged the Lilongwe-donor standoff, further hurting
the economy. In February 2012, the finance ministry
predicted a $121m budget shortfall in the current fiscal
year despite austerity measures.
At the time of his death Mutharika was facing mounting
pressure from civil society to step down. This included a
March 2012 call by the influential Public Affairs Committee
(PAC), a religious rights group, for the resignation of the
president or for a referendum for the president to seek a
fresh mandate from Malawians within 90 days or face 'civil
disobedience'.
When Banda took the presidential oath on 7 April, she faced
significant challenges that could shake her reign. First,
Banda must win over enough MPs so that the DPP-dominated
parliament will not block her efforts to govern.
Second, Banda has to win back donor confidence and support
for Malawi's suffocating economy. It remains to be seen
whether Banda can be careful in her efforts to swiftly
reconcile with the West, yet not risk isolation by her
Southern African peers in a region in which liberation
movement-turned ruling political party camaraderie, antiimperialist
solidarity and an old-boys network still hold
sway.
Third, Banda has to balance implementing democratic reforms
and some austerity measures to restore the country's economy
while retaining parliament's vote of confidence and public
support.
Fourth, Banda will soon have to decide whether to allow
Sudanese president Omar Hassan al-Bashir to enter the
country in July to attend the African Union Summit taking
place in Lilongwe. This after the International Criminal
Court referred the country to the United Nations Security
Council for refusing to arrest the indicted Sudanese leader
during his visit to Malawi in October last year.
Having the second woman as president is a major step forward
for Africa. Having the first woman as president is an even
bigger step for Southern Africa. But, the challenges are
daunting and she will need all the support she can get. We
wish her well!
AfricaFocus Bulletin is an independent electronic
publication providing reposted commentary and analysis on
African issues, with a particular focus on U.S. and
international policies. AfricaFocus Bulletin is edited by
William Minter.
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