On the Age Limit Bill, Injunction on Chaponda

A proposed Private Member’s Bill seeking a constitutional amendment to bar any person aged above 80 years from contesting for the presidency was bound to fail anyway. The Bill was going nowhere because it is a bad bill, with ulterior, selfish and partisan intentions and was being sponsored by someone who is sitting on the wrong end of a political battle.

We all know that the Mulanje Central legislator Kondwani Nankhumwa is enmeshed in a political wrangle with his former political party, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). And as you read this, he is now well and truly a rank outsider with no moral or legal right to claim to belong to the party. That he is still battling in court to have his expulsion reversed will not save him. He can get reprieve from courts as he has managed a few time times before, but such will be very temporary. Nankhumwa is standing on sinking sand. I can guarantee that it will take a miracle for him to stop the machines now grinding to formally jettison him from the party.

Courts are not best suited to adjudicate on partisan political wrangles. The man has done enough damage to the DPP that he seems to have even lost not only his once enviable hoard of sympathisers within the party but himself as well. Going forward, he should know the court will not reverse his divorce with DPP. The marriage is over. As I said the other day, anything else remaining between him and DPP are just kicks of a dying hoarse.

Now on the niggling threesome debacle of the Speaker Catherine Gotani Hara, DPP Legislator for Mulanje Central South West George Chaponda and again Nankhumwa. First, the Speaker pens Chaponda inviting him to the Business Committee Meeting as Leader of Opposition (LoP). Then something whispers to her that she needs the Attorney General’s (AG) counsel on the matter. The AG then duly advises that there is a running court injunction against Chaponda being made LoP. And, until this injunction is vacated, Nankhumwa, remains LoP. Gotani Hara then quickly invites Nankhumwa to the Business Committee Meeting. Meanwhile, in the mix of all this confusion, she forgets to get back to Chaponda to inform him that it is Nankhumwa and not him who will attend the meeting as LoP because there is a running injunction on the matter.

On the material day, both Chaponda and Nankhumwa turn up for the meeting at Parliament Building. Whereupon it dawns on Hara that she forgot to get back to Chaponda to inform him that there is an unresolved issue of the injunction on him which prevents him from being appointed LoP and attending the Business Committee meeting.

Following this unfortunate situation, Nankhumwa has been the target of so much bashing and insults about why he is clinging to the position of LoP after DPP expelled him from the party. Some circles are also presenting the matter as if Nankhumwa has connived with the Speaker to embarrass Chaponda.

I beg to differ. The culprit here is fairly and squarely the Speaker and all the advisers around her office. It is not for nothing that the Clerk of Parliament (CoP) and some of her assistants are lawyers. Did the Speaker ignore her or their advice on the matter? Or did they give her wrong advice?

Either way, upon being informed that there is an injunction on Chaponda, the Speaker could have averted the unenviable development that happened on Wednesday by swiftly reverting to the Mulanje South West legislator to inform him and even apologise to him about the injunction issue. In fact, in the first place, she should not have proceeded to invite Chaponda before hearing from the AG. DPP lawyers also seem to have forgotten about the injunction on Chaponda.

The drama that ensued as a result of the Speaker not getting back to Chaponda is, therefore, fairly and squarely blamed on her. She failed to act swiftly to avoid the embarrassing situation. She should have done better.