Please, Don't Reprise Ghana In Malawi!

By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

African Union (AU) representatives on the ground in the country's commercial capital of Blantyre claim that Malawi's recent general election was conducted in a "largely transparent manner" (See "Malawi Vote 'Credible' Despite Troubles, Says Electoral Chief" Modernghana.com 5/29/14). Politically speaking, even as we all witnessed with indescribable horror a strikingly similar situation in Ghana nearly a year ago, both the AU and the latter's local representatives in the ECOWAS sub-region could at best be clinically characterized as "mildly retarded."

And, of course, by the latter designation is clearly implied the fact that the generally bleak economic situation on the continent can justifiably be coupled with a pathological state of acute psychological mediocrity which shows no signs of let or abatement whatsoever. In sum, what I am trying to get at is that if, indeed, the AU representatives in Malawi strongly believe that the election was "largely transparent in manner," then the logical question to ask is as follows: What aspect of the process, or conduct, of the election "marginally" left much to be desired? And also: Why should the rest of the African world, in particular, and the global community, in general, believe that whatever marginally left much to be desired wasn't considerable enough to have seriously compromised the credibility of the entire process?

There are also other factors that we need to know in order to be able to conduct a fair and objective analysis of the credibility of the AU observers' report. For instance, who are these observers? Was their group "largely" composed of the usual suspects, former continental African strongmen turned latter-day apostles of democratic governance, that is cynical political operatives who may duly be returning favors for done them in the recent past?

We need to also highlight the fact that it is not only Mrs. Joyce Banda, the presidential incumbent, who is complaining about a seriously compromised electoral process. The presidential candidate of the opposition Malawi Congress Party (MCP), Mr. Lazarus Chakwera, who was running second in preliminary results, has also called for a recount. We also have to be a little more than worried about the fact that the man likely to be declared the winner, Mr. Peter Mutharika, of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), has reportedly teamed up with lawyers representing the country's Electoral Commission to prevent the constitutionally mandated 30-day extension for recount, should there arise any clear evidence of electoral fraud or irregularities.

Then also ought to be significantly borne in mind that notwithstanding the presidential incumbency of Mrs. Joyce Banda, the party in power is Peter Mutharika's Democratic Progressive Party, which was Peter's deceased elder brother, President Bingu wa Mutharika led for some eight years, and not Mrs. Banda's Malawi People's Party (MPP) which she only founded several years ago when she was forced out of the DPP by the Mutharika brothers and their political associates and allies.

Mrs. Banda only became the contigent, or transitional, president upon the demise of the elder Mr. Mutharika barely two years ago. Back then, younger brother Peter had criminally attempted to prevent Mrs. Banda, the legitimate second-in-command, from assuming the presidency. It well appears that Mrs. Banda had just been brought along for the ride by Brother Bingu, who really wanted his kid brother to succeed him. We are told that Peter, a senior cabinet member in his brother's government, had flown the remains of the deceased president out of Malawi and into South Africa, evidently to unduly delay the official announcement of the inevitable while what clearly amounted to a coup detat was systematically and suavely staged against President Banda.

That Peter Mutharika was allowed to contest for the presidency, despite serious treason charges pending in court against him, says much about the acute fragility and downright inefficiency of both the Malawi judicial system and the country's Electoral Commission, which is not really saying much. It also well appears that going into the general election, the presidential incumbent was the gapingly obvious political underdog. And it is not even clear just what firm measures the decidedly ostracized President Banda had been able to put in place in order to ensure that her Malawi People's Party took effective control of the administrative machinery of the state. Needless to say, two years is a rather short space of time; and not surprisingly, the largely nominal incumbent does not appear to have been any significantly successful in this direction.

Which is why even as the bona fide incumbent, nonetheless, Mrs. Banda has mounted the paradoxical, albeit vehement, protestation of an opposition politician. Interestingly, the election chief, Maxon Mbendera, publicly admits that he has personally witnessed several incidents of what he terms as electoral "anomalies" but adamantly insists that "99-percent of the voting" process was absolutely "trouble free." Mr. Mbendera has yet to explain precisely how he had arrived at his rather pontifical conclusion that only 1-percent of the voting process had in any way been compromised.

Sounds and reads eerily like the Afari-Gyan Story in faraway Ghana, doesn't it?

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*Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Department of English
Nassau Community College of SUNY
Garden City, New York
Board Member, The Nassau Review
May 29, 2014
E-mail: [email protected]
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