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By Charles Twitch Nyerere
Actually from the look of things-Malawians are no longer “in slumbers” as “most people think they are”. Gone were the days when Malawians would not counter profusely to public addresses/pressers. Now that we have radios and social Media platforms things have changed.
I watched carefully the ACB presser with a feeling that I would pick substance out of it only to be angered with what I can call denial of public information. The time it was announced that the director general of Anti-corruption Bureau (ACB) Rayneck Matemba would address the national in reaction to attempts to bribe constitution court judges handling high profile Electoral case, almost each and everyone’s mind was on the names of these suspected bribers.
As we are talking now Malawians awaits the highly anticipated verdict of the high profile presidential electoral case, as such anything that comes in contact with it is of a huge public interest and Malawians would want to hear it frankly. The fact that Chief Justice submitted the names and ACB is failing to mention them is not on and leaves loopholes for destructive rumors.
The ACB director shouldn’t have wasted people’s patience and time with presser that did not unmask any suspected name. The briefing that later turned personified mixed with emotions by Matemba went ahead and dodged questions from the media houses. Instead he introduced us the already known fact that “Malawians indeed lost trust in ACB” and usually treat the Bureau as belonging to “Cadets.”
The process of gaining lost credibility by ACB began the moment when it issued a notice of public address. By slight narrowing the jigsaw puzzle that the first suspected name is a senior officer in public sector and the other is from private sector can be commended but that is not enough to quench public thirsty. Instead it leaves a lot of public speculations can attract character assassination since everyone is free to associate a name he or she thinks is connected.
Is ACB reluctant to act swiftly? Well if what I am hearing is true that the case was reported to ACB on 28th November 2019; the time the case was being heard, then ACB is very reluctant in handling this “burning issue” and I am puzzled if at any time the public will back them that they are doing good job.
Matemba did not only play with people’s patience but tried to loose us in thinking. Well how could he say Malawians should not be obsessed with arrests? At the same time saying the case are related yes but are totally different. I quickly asked myself why people get arrest. Is not the fact that they are suspected of wrong doing? If the whole Director is suggesting that making arrest in not a first move then he has lost me because what we are talking here is a bribery case linking to the high profile “Constitutional Case number 1 of 2019”.
The truth of the matter should be told that the electoral case is highly overrated, and the urgency of this matte lies in the hands of ACB to be concluded as soon as possible; before verdict can much better, because people will actually know which sides were trying to play cards behind curtains. Even HRDC demos on Thursday, 16 January called the state-funded body-ACB to swiftly act according in their investigations. This is how the people are eagerly waiting for outcomes of these cases.
I still believe that ACB being state funded-entity can do better than it has done before. This “bribery” case presents them a test to either win back the lost credibility; if they act accordingly to resolve it or not. We are aware that there are cases at ACB mounting dust in files without progress. This attempted bribery allegation has significant implications to the verdict of presidential electoral case and need to be treated with urgency because the two are directly linked.
“The author of this article is a social work graduate from the Catholic University of Malawi. He likes commenting on current affairs and social related issues.”
Feedback: charlesbnyerere@gmail.com
