Gotani-Hara’s poly tricks

September 4 2024

Dear Diary,

As I write from the Munda wa Chitedze Farm, the jacaranda tree flowers have turned purple, greeting summer.

We are busy making manure for our chitedze, buffalo beans.

Remember what I said the other day, chitedze is food that can supplement our diets. Chitedze is in the same family as kalingonda. In the Lhomwe belt, a dish of makaka and kalongonda is just wow!

This comes to mind as people in T/A Mtumbwinda’s area in Machinga are eating chitedze as maize is scarce, like in most areas. As the chief says, hunger is rife and the danger is that when not well cooked, chitedze is poisonous. Just like the kalongonda we find in the markets. Remember it killed the Ngoni at Nguludi!

I feel for Machinga South East parliamentarian Fyness Magonjwa who acknowledged that people in the area are eating chitedze.

Responding, Agriculture Minister Sam Kawale had a word of comfort for her. He said a fortnight ago, 4 000 bags were sent into the district to avert hunger. That was even cause for Majongwa to worry since, in her words, the 4 000 bags were a drop in the ocean since of 7 292 people in need of food, only 176 benefitted.

Members of Parliament have shown anger at the hunger Malawians are facing. Even Leader of the House Richard Chimwendo Banda and Agriculture Minister Sam Kawale acknowledged that although food distribution was happening across the country, it was inadequate.

Department of Disaster Management Affairs director Charles Kalemba says K88 billion more is needed to get maize for the 5.7 million starving Malawians.

While the parliamentarians were discussing these food issues, diverting to the plane crash report and even a consideration to raise the constituency development fund, President Lazarus Chakwera was somewhere in China in the first leg of a tour that would see him in Japan and America.

Dear Diary, at the Livingstonia Synod of the CCAP biennial conference, Speaker of the National Assembly Catherine Gotani-Hara gave a locution on food. Remember the conference ended in tears with allegations that some 50 ministers previously sneaked to the State Lodge in Mzuzu to meet Chakwera.

She said when the pot is not boiling because of wet fuelwood, you don’t stop cooking but bring more dry wood. She meant if there is something wrong with the Chakwera government, the solution was not to remove him, but make him perform better.

But then, it appears had Gotani Hara chosen to contest against Chakwera at the just ended convention, she could have made him sweat real hard. Look, she defeated stalwarts Simplex Chithyola Banda, Ken Zikhale-Ng’oma, Vitumbiko Mumba and Moses Kunkuyu. In fact, ‘bulldozer’ Richard Chimwendo Banda had to chicken out at the last minute and vie for the secretary general position.

By beating the other contenders, it only shows how much respect the party holds for her. Only if she knew it, she could have been on the forefront to go against the national executive council imposition of Chakwera.

It could be she was only playing her political cards right. With the Kondwani Nankhumwa experience in the Democratic Progressive Party and Brown Mpinganjira in the United Democratic Front, she may have known standing against party directions is doom.

As she is free to speak in parables, we are apt to interpret it any way which. In her poly tricks, Gotani-Hara only sweet-coated her words.

Otherwise, her political rise is something to commend. She is first lady MCP veep. She became the first Malawi National Assembly Speaker when she narrowly beat Esther Mcheka-Chilenje after the House decided in 2019 that the contest for the position should be between women. So it was a ruling candidate against another one from the opposition.

Well, as Gotani-Hara is now presiding over a House that is in total accord on the hunger situation, she must throw poly tricks aside and not be seen to be taking sides in this matter of national interest. She can’t defend a pot that is not boiling.

It would harm no one if Chakwera pulled aside and paved the way for Gotani-Hara to be the presidential candidate. You see, the Donald Trump campaign changed course when Joe Biden pulled aside and Kamala Harris came in.

Otherwise, for Malawians to choose between Chakwera and Peter Mutharika it will be a real daunting task.