Malawi Chiefs Labelled Headless Chickens

By:  Happy Arnold Soko

Chiefs in the country have come under fire for being used by the government to defend the Leadership of Peter Mutharika and its faulty administration in addressing the persistent crisis in the country.

Recently, Traditional Leaders have been holding press conference in all the 3 regions responding to opposition parties’ call for the President’s resignation.

Opposition Malawi Congress Party MCP, Peoples Party and Alliance for Democracy (Aford) have given Mutharika a 30 day ultimatum to resolve the maize crisis and fix current economic and social challenges within 90 days.

A voxpop interview by The Malawi Star established that many Malawians are against the idea of Chiefs backing Mutharika.

In his remarks, Mac Donald Luwe expressed his shock citing that this development by the chiefs is a betrayal of their own local people who are greatly suffering.

He explained, “Sometimes I fail to understand our traditional leaders.  They are behaving as headless chickens. Do they mean they are fine with the situation that Malawi is going through? If they are given something to defend Mutharika, they better be careful. We are tired with this government and what we need is a change.”

But speaking with this publication, Peoples Party publicity secretary Ken Msonda said that traditional leaders play a very important role as custodians of culture and their decisions should not hurt poor people.

“We as opposition have played a rightful role as representatives of the poor masses who are suffering out there; people who are having problems to access maize in the ADMARC markets, patients who are sleeping on empty stomachs in hospitals and many other issues that this country is facing.

“Private Sector Entrepreneurs who are not being paid by government, business people who are paying high interests rates in banks and companies that are laying off people because our economy is not ticking not to mention our kwacha’s poor performance against the dollar.”

Meanwhile, a Lilongwe based activist Billy Mayaya is expected to hold demonstrations on 10^th March to push the Malawi Leader to address the current economic challenges.