The Tribune (Blantyre)
26 December 2008
analysis
Is President Bingu wa Mutharika a dictator or a democrat? This is a question which bothers many people when they are discussing political issues in Malawi.
With more and more analysts alleging that Mutharika is revolving into a dictator, The Tribune analyses some of the issues that have led to the new political conclusion.
When it comes to arresting his political opponents to face serious charges of treason, sedition and related charges, Mutharika seems to be walking in the footsteps of all worst dictators. In a typical manner the founding president of Malawi Dr Kamuzu Banda used to boast when his opponents were arrested, Mutharika is doing the same in a multi-party democracy. The worst part of it is that most of those being persecuted because of their political beliefs are arrested on flimsy charges, yet the noise that is made when they are being arrested is that of "treason."
Several opposition figures arrested during Mutharika's tenure some of whom had their cases dropped because of lack of evidence are all living testimonies that if the trend is not going to change, Malawi is indeed on the super highway to the worst type of dictatorship during Mutharika second term of office. Branding the tendency of arresting his opponents as his "political tit-for-tat strategy, opposition leaders continue to be persecuted even when they have not committed any offence. It is simply a game of suspicion and political persecution. The list of such cases is endless.
Merely seven months after ascending into power, in January 2005, four opposition United Democratic Front (UDF) officials namely Harry Thomson, Alfred Mwechumu, Roy Commsy, Jordan Kanyerere made Mutharika to shout: "Treason!" and the four were arrested for simply going to Sanjika Palace for a meeting which Mutharika himself had convened. Just like all trumped up cases in dictatorships, the treason case of the four didn't take too long to fizzle, amid derisive public incredulity. If you ask who lost case, the answer is straight-forward because Mutharika regime coughed a cool K2 million to compensate Thomson for defamation following a lawsuit he filed. The comical part of it is that Mutharika recruited one of the suspected assassins Roy Commsy into his cabinet forcing political commentator Tom Likambale to observe: "If you today put into your cabinet someone whom you accused yesterday of trying to snuff the life out you, you must either be abundantly careless with your life or you must have been hallucinating when you accused them of trying to kill you, and have now come back to your senses. Either way, you are not fit to be president of a self-respecting nation."
If you think that it was only in 2005 that Mutharika shouted the word "treason" on top of his voice, then you are mistaken, because in April 2006, on the eve of Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe's State visit to Malawi, his administration also arrested some top UDF officials on the allegations of treason. They included Hophmally Makande, Humphrey Mvula, Ndaila Onani, Rashid Nembo, Muhamad Kulesi, wife of Shaban Kadango (arrested on behalf of her husband); and Malawi Democratic Party leader Kamlepo Kalua.
Was it really treason or Mutharika's hallucination? Nobody really knows but the truth of the matter was that after spending a week in the cooler, the so-called treason suspects were all released without benefit of a trial through which they could actively exonerate themselves.
Treason being the catchword, in the same year, Mutharika's own deputy Cassim Chilumpha was arrested alongside other UDF officials namely Yusuf Matumula and Rashid Nembo, for allegedly plotting to assassinate Mutharika. The charges were nothing but those of "treason." Chilumpha for two years has been under house arrest for plotting to assassinate his boss.
With the government including the State House, in a twist of events, starting pouring praises on alleged coup-plotting Chilumpha, only God know whether the matter was about treason or someone's hallucination; as it is not the duty of this paper to allege that the State may abandon Chilumpha's case for either lack of evidence or simply in the name of forgiveness and reconciliation
Chilumpha's case which has been dragging for two years was not the last treason (or should it be hallucination) as just recently some top former and serving security officials had a rude awakening of their lives when they were arrested on allegations of plotting to stage a coup. The arrested ones included Juvenalis Mtende, Marcel Chirwa, Cosgrove Mituka, Joseph Chimbayo, Aironi, Matthews Masoapyola and Chitsulo Gama. Besides the security officials, senior UDF officials Kennedy Makwangwala and John Chikakwiya were also netted. Treason (or somebody's hallucination?) was once again what the suspects were charged for.
The climax of the tragic-comedy called Treason whose main theme seems to be "political tit-for tat" reached its climax when Muluzi was arrested in May this year on allegations of plotting to overthrow Mutharika. What was a tragedy turned into a comedy when the State failed to charge Muluzi for over three months despite arresting him in a theatrical manner at Kamuzu International Airport with military planes.
Whether the poorly organized performance of a tragic-comedy called "treason" has ended with Muluzi's arrest, nobody seems to know, perhaps so long as somebody does not hallucinate again.
Despite these shouts and hallucinations of treasons, the good news is that the judiciary continues to show those in power that they are not kangaroo tribunals set up merely to prop up dictatorship; but, rather, that they can throw out blatantly inadmissible documents that are undated and unsigned that purport to be communications on coup plots, just because there are some people elsewhere who all the time when hallucinating appear to see coup plotters, which are actually non-existent.
The arrests of political opponents prove the age-old fact that dictatorships all over the globe thrive on intimidation.
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