Malawi@50: What are we celebrating?

Milestones such as wedding anniversaries, birthdays and confirmation into a faith are worth celebrating as they provide individuals and families an opportunity to reflect on their past and plan for the future.

Likewise, countries, year in year out, commemorate days when they became independent sovereign States.

It is in this spirit that Malawi will this Sunday, July 6, hosts the 50th Independence Anniversary Celebrations at Civo Stadium in Lilongwe.

Fifty years or golden jubilee is worth celebrating. It cannot just go like that without a celebration, as Vice-President Saulos Chilima rightly put it when he announced that the independence feast will cost taxpayers a cool K200 million.

The 50 years from 1964 to date have been a mixed bag, to say the least.

For example, during the first 50 years of ‘political independence’ from Britain, Malawi has recorded several milestones such as having four public universities (the University of Malawi, Mzuzu University, Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources and Malawi University of Science and Technology), including a medical college and constructing basic infrastructure such as tarmac roads, albeit not enough, connecting most of the district centres and major towns.

During the same period, the country also voted against single-party rule and ushered in multiparty democracy through a 1993 National Referendum.

However, despite some achievements, the country has failed to graduate from economic dependence on development partners and our former colonial master, Britain, who collectively finance 40 tambala out of every K1 in our recurrent budget and 80 tambala in every K1 of the development budget.

This is in sharp contrast to our neighbours, Zambia, for instance, where donors’ contribution stands at five percent of the budget.

Now, Zambia is not in a different planet. In fact, the boundary between Malawi and Zambia, as founding president the late Hastings Kamuzu Banda used to say, are artificial, drawn by colonialists. Yet, today, Zambia, which ironically had its foreign debt written off alongside Malawi around 2006, is a middle-income country.

Worth more reflection is the fact that Malawi is put in the same bracket of 10 poorest economies by rank on the African continent alongside countries that have been at war.

In 50 years, our country has only connected to the national electricity grid 10 out of every 100 people. Water supply remains erratic as well.

Ironically, some of the challenges our country faces, especially on the economic front, have come against a background of several prescriptions from international financial institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Sadly, despite all this, Malawi has lagged behind other countries such as Mauritius with whom it was on equal footing in terms of economic growth in the 1960s.

And just this week, the Minister of Finance sought approval of Parliament to borrow about K9 billion for construction of public toilets and drilling of boreholes at several trading centres. Honestly, in 2014, we should be thinking beyond a borehole. Why not develop a piped water supply system that will benefit a larger population around those areas while raising revenue from users?

Earlier this year, British High Commissioner Michael Nevin said it was high time Malawi changed its perception of looking at its former colonial master, Britain, as its “mother” and move away from dependency.

In his words, Nevin said: “The connotation of mother is one of dependency. So, we need to move away from that psychological thinking of one of dependency to one of doing things as an equal partner of the UK and also doing things for yourself.”

Nevin was not reinventing the wheel. Several commentators, including yours truly, have emphasised the need for our country to be economically independent. But, as they say, timadikira mzungu kuti anene (when it is said by a white man, it is taken seriously).

So, when we gather at Civo Stadium in Lilongwe this Sunday for the golden jubilee, we need to reflect on our past, see where we went wrong and how we can improve on our weaknesses to rise to the occasion. We should also ask ourselves the question: What are we celebrating?