Don’t make DPP more important than it is

There is a whole lot of truth in the statement that Malawi’s present economic malaise was caused by DPP and the late Bingu wa Mutharika, just like I shudder when I think of how worse matters would have been if the unseen hand of fate did not intervene in April last year.

We were simply facing total collapse before Bingu died and the DPP knows this as it is not a secret.

PP only comes into the picture when we begin to debate whether the solution they have prescribed, that is the wholesale implementation of IMF’s bitter prescription, will bear fruit and when.

There are also attendant issues which PP must account for, such as whether as a government, President Joyce Banda and her Cabinet have done enough to share the pain that the common person is going through as a result of their economic policies.

Not to forget is also the fact that we cannot forever look back and blame the late Mutharika because PP now has an amazing chance to put things right if it wants Malawians to take it seriously and give it their mandate next year. Blaming Mutharika has run its full course.

Yet, when everything is said and done, the unpleasant truth remains that the problems Malawi is going through were created by DPP and the late Bingu through, among other things, their confrontational approach to donors leading to total withdrawal of vital aid to the country, thereby cutting critical supply of forex that led to shortages.

When you add on the DPP plate things such as mass murder of people in 2011; promulgation of bad laws that merely served to pamper or massage the over-inflated ego of Bingu; brutal killing of Polytechnic student Robert Chasowa, among other evils, you would think this is a party that must never be anywhere near power in Malawi again.

To sum up, DPP clearly showed during its rule that given absolute power, it would abuse it absolutely.

Fast-forward everything to March, 2013 and suddenly DPP’s propaganda machine is in full gear to paint itself as a victim of some sort after its top leadership was arrested three weeks ago to account for their actions after the death of Bingu.

Nicholas Dausi made sure he complained about mosquito bites at Lumbadzi Police Station where he was locked up together with Peter Mutharika and others, forgetting that this was the modus operandi of DPP to silence critics.

The police, too, are not helping matters either by constantly following Peter everywhere as if he were important and firing tear gas at those who, surprisingly, think he has anything to offer. Yet, when he supported his brother as he was abusing us and taking bad decisions such as expelling a British High Commissioner whose effect only was to punish poor Malawians.

As if this was not enough, some PP zealots foolishly decided to issue threats to Judge Ivy Kamanga for merely giving bail to Peter and others in the treason case.

As I said, all this has a singular effect of making all of us to be sympathetic to a party that does not even deserve a single iota of our thoughts because of the way it treated us when it was in power:

We lived in constant fear as if Malawi was not our country or we were second class citizens, all merely because we called Bingu the right names when he made it his business to mess with our lives.

My message to all those who are helping the cause of DPP by taking actions I have described above should be very simple: Give us a break.

There are better things to do than everyday hearing of some injustice perpetuated against DPP. It is making the party look like saints when we know they are devils but now conveniently wrapped in the sheep skin.

Do not make DPP more important than it is.