MPs, too, will lose out on passports

Dear Diary,

As I write, the heat is so intense as if we were in October. Maize is wilting in the gardens. A really sorry state. While about four million Malawians face hunger due to scarcity of maize, the future is gloomy, as production may drastically drop in the next harvest.

Nothing to smile about.

As I write, some pictures and clips are going viral of a coffin dumped at the Kamuzu Central Hospital in Lilongwe. Some are claiming each of two aspiring candidates bought a coffin for a dead constituent, and being potential voters, the potential voters chose the coffin from their perceived better candidate!

Sad as it may be, the reality is that some politicians, if not most, use funerals as part of their trump cards to win votes.

You see, Dear Diary, even at funerals, contestants will race over who will give more condolence to the bereaved! Campaign directors’ pockets will be full in case the contestants will not be in the constituency when the skies have fallen.

You can’t be wrong to think that this propensity to please the dead can lead some parliamentarians to divert constituency development funds (CDF) to funeral affairs.

It’s not just off the air, but you see, while Democratic Progressive Party parliamentarians were given matching orders and they were happily desecrating the decorum of the National Assembly, in the Chamber the government backbenchers started talking about raising the CDF to K200 million, from K100 million.

Only on  Wednesday, when President Lazarus Chakwera was in the House to take questions from MPs, the issue of raising the CDF was among the most emphasised. It seemed as though while over-praising Chakwera for the State of the Nation Address, the MPs were looking forward to increased CDF allocations.

As I write, Finance Minister Simplex Chithyola Banda will tomorrow present the 2024-2025 National Budget. It is not yet known whether the call for a raise in the CDF will be honoured.

Whatever the case, when it comes to increasing their perks, MPs have no two ways about it. When it comes to raising the CDF, there is neither government nor opposition side in the august House. They can scream like nursery toddlers over petty issues but agree on one thing.

Meanwhile, Malawians continue to go hungry as MPs may be thinking of how they can get back to Parliament in 2025. Malawi’s problems abound.

Yet, our MPs should reckon that some of them will lose their hands on the CDF and other emoluments come next year.

Dear Diary, indeed, some of them will lose their diplomatic passports! Among those who are entitled to a diplomatic passport are the President, the First Lady, Cabinet ministers, the Speaker of the National Assembly, diplomats, the police Inspector General, the Army Commander… hey the list is long!

But one thing that the law says is that all the other officials’ diplomatic passports expire after 10 years, it is only five years for parliamentarians.

So, once they are out of the House, Parliamentarians lose their diplomatic passports.

In essence, then, while parliamentarians think they are above Malawians’ calamities, they will soon know the sad truth that life is not all beer and skittles.

Malawi has been a bundle of contradictions. With Israel is dangling 100 000 jobs, passports become the Holy Grail in Malawi. While some are offered scholarships that will let them steep from poverty, they can’t access a passport. A woman lands a ‘deal’ to buy rice and usipa from Domasi to sell in South Africa can’t get the deal because she has no passport.

And what explanation do you get from President Lazarus Chakwera? The Immigration Department has been hacked and some criminals are looking for a ransom.

Wait a minute, the President just told the world that the Malawi passport has been prone to hackers! Funny things do happen in Malawi.

Take it or leave, Dear Diary, the grapevine on the street has it that the hackers are from within the government machinery. We just need to wait as the time is ticking for the parliamentarians, whom Chakwera was addressing, will be on the queues at the passport office to get passports that are not there.

You see, Dear Diary, it’s all like a blind man looking for a black radio in a dark room that is not even there!