MBC slowly opening up to opposing views

Following President Joyce Banda’s calls to open the airwaves of State broadcaster Malawi Broadcasting Corporation (MBC), the station’s Radio One on Sunday held an open debate that brought together people from the opposition and ruling party.

The radio station, which previously shunned the opposition and was more of a mouth piece of the then ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), tackled the merit behind various commissions’ of enquiry which have been established by the People’s Party (PP) government to probe some key outstanding issues, including the death of president Bingu wa Mutharika, the death of Polytechnic student Robert Chasowa and the Malawi Revenue Authority (MRA) scam.

The panellists were Democratic Progressive Party’s publicity secretary Nicholas Dausi, United Democratic Front (UDF) director of research Humphrey Mvula of the Friday Jumbe camp and Minister of Justice and Constitutional Affairs Ralph Kasambara.

Also under discussion was Section 65 of the Constitution which calls for the Speaker to declare vacant a seat of a Member of Parliament who is deemed to have crossed the floor.

According to the programme producer and presenter Emmanuel Thuwala, the debate is a new programme Tikambirane which will be aired every Sunday around lunch hour as a platform for discussing emerging issues in the country.