Malawi Government on Monday said a statement from the civil society organisations (CSOs) Grand Coalition proposing to move Parliament to have an interim government until the next elections is treasonous.
But Minister of Information and Civic Education Brown Mpinganjira, who is also the official spokesperson of the government, said the Joyce Banda administration will not take any action against the CSOs because it trusts in the maturity of Malawians whom, he said, would see the folly in the statement.
Mpinganjira, speaking in an exclusive interview in Blantyre on Monday, accused leaders of the CSOs of using an inflammatory and threatening tone in their statement, adding that government has taken a reconciliatory approach which he said must never be mistaken for weakness.
In their statement published in the country’s two dailies yesterday, the CSOs, led by the Council for Non Governmental Organisations in Malawi (Congoma), said as an action plan on the Capital Hill cashgate, if government failed to meet some demands laid down, they were going to collect one million or so signatures to give a vote of no-confidence.
The CSOs also planned to institute black Mondays when protesters would wear black attire, hold periodic mass demonstrations nationwide, stay away from work and occupy Capital Hill and State Houses, among other courses of action.
The CSO leaders said they were concerned that in the face of the Capital Hill cashgate and where donors have frozen aid, the President continued to travel, making 14 local trips between July and October 2013.
But Mpinganjira said the President is keen to engage the CSO leaders and all other players, warning that any attempt to intimidate each other into submission would not help.
He said the People’s Party (PP) government is constitutionally instituted and to call for its removal was tantamount to a coup, but government would not be pushed to go that far and take drastic measures because Malawians are the best judges.
The minister feared the NGOs were serving the interest of the opposition.
Congoma chairperson Voice Mhone said they were convinced they have done everything within the law.
He said the former ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) accused them then of serving the interests of Joyce Banda and is not surprised that today they are being accused of serving the interests of the opposition, saying that is how politicians have always behaved.
