Time is a vagrant. She is a retired teacher, who was taught in secondary school by the deceased Vice-President Saulos Chilima’s mother. She was President Lazarus Chakwera’s classmate in college.
Secretary to the President and Cabinet Colleen Zamba’s father, years past, recommended her promotion because of her teaching methods. Meet Eve Maliwichi, the teacher who converted Vice- President Michael Usi to drama. Kondwani Kamiyala writes:
June 10 2024 is a mark on the Malawi history timeline, as nine people, including the country’s Vice-President Saulos Chilima, died in a plane crash in Mzimba.
On the edges of their seats, Malawians waited with unabated breath to see who would replace Chilima. President Lazarus Chakwera had seven days to choose MG2, as the Constitution requires in the event of the Veep death, resignation or incapacitation.
Social media went into frenzy on who would be the next Veep. Some claimed Chakwera would choose from the Malawi Congress Party. Others said he would pick someone from the UTM Party, which Chilima founded.
Still more, others thought he was not going to choose a politician.
Yet, on June 20, Secretary to the President and Cabinet Colleen Zamba announced Chakwera had chosen Michael Usi, UTM Party second-incommand.
Manganya, the persona Usi wears in drama circles, overshadows his professional prowess, educational qualifications and personality traits.
Usi faces the calamity of actors off the stage or screen, as people think they live the characters they portray. John Nyanga, aka Izeki, often complained about how little children called him by his moniker while adults wanted him to crack jokes even at funerals.
Radio and stage drama magnet Enifa Chiwaya, aka Nanyoni, remembers a point when she paid rent in advance to occupy a house, but the landlady returned the money when she found out that her would-be tenant was the talkative Nanyoni.
Usi may have been, for years on end, Adventist Relief Agency (Adra) country director but many Malawians would only associate him with a minute part of his role at the international NGO.
They know him more as Manganya in the radio and television soap, Tikuferanji.
Manganya exploits are also evident on the small screen in films like ‘Dr Manga’.
His side-splitting drama in several theatrical acts, including an impersonation of Malawi’s first president Hastings Kamuzu Banda, surrounded by his Mbumba and in an open Land Rover.
During the Bingu wa Mutharika regime, he also brought the hard-hitting ‘Loto la Farao’ and when Peter Mutharika was president, he ignited fire at the Comesa Hall in Blantyre with ‘Ulalikiwu Ngwatonse’.
Before his appointment, little was said about his education. Very few cared that the man behind Manganya held two masters’ degrees and, in fact, a doctor of philosophy. That is not including his professional genesis as a medical assistant.
Much as he walked through the corridors of the universities of Bedfordshire and Derby in the United Kingdom, Andrews University in the United States of America and the Malamulo Medical College at home, Usi recalls that it was Mulanje Secondary School where his interest in drama was ignited.
In a 2016 interview, Usi paid homage to one teacher at the school who introduced him to drama.
He said: “It all started with a Mrs Maliwichi, my English Literature teacher at the school who spotted and motivated me and made me what I am today. Although I used to be quiet, observant and always commenting on issues when the need arose, my teacher saw the acting potential in me.”
Usi, who hails from Golden Village in T/A Chikumbu’s area in the district, recalled that the teacher first featured him as Ikemefuna, a character in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart. “Since then, I found it easy to communicate through theatre until 1990 when we established my first theatre group which was carrying out campaigns against non-communicable diseases,” said Usi.
After Usi was sworn in as Veep, Society sought out the teacher who directed him into acting. Eve Maliwichi (nee Kunkwenzu), a retired teacher and former Registrar of the Malawi College of Health Sciences (MCHS) gave out a hearty laugh when we introduced our subject.
She agreed to have given Usi the difficult part during the literature lesson when he was in Form 3.
“I found his character to be strong. He was fluent in English. That was just what I needed to bring out Ikemefuna, the beloved child of Okonkwo as compared to Nwoye, a weakling. Dr Usi handled the character so well I encouraged him to join our drama club. At the time, he was a member of the wildlife club or something else,” says the mother of four.
In 1983, when she joined Musescho, as the school is fondly called by students and the alumni, there was no drama club at the school, unlike her previous posting at Likuni Girls Secondary School. In fact, she was patron of the drama club when the school lifted the coveted Atem drama contest for secondary schools with a play titled ‘The Banana Tree’.
But how did she feel that one of her students was now Vice-President of the Republic? Maliwichi laughed, again, and said: “I feel so blessed. As a teacher, our students take up great positions. It is a lesson in my life that every teacher must treat their learners perfectly well. You don’t even know what they will become later in life.”
Citing Usi’s example, Maliwichi feels drama increases one’s chances to progress in othercareers. That, she says, is because theatre makes you more ‘industrious and independent’.
She feels Manganya, as a character, is strong and avoids laziness and weakness, just like Usi.
“As far as I see, the Manganya character earns respect from those around him in the acts because he doesn’t pretend. The scripts flow naturally like water,” she observes.
For her, drama is a vehicle for transitioning from harmful cultures and educating on social issues, apart from merely entertaining.
“I encourage students, especially girls to do and join drama. It boosts their self esteem. Public speaking and presentation skills ge better with drama. Even as a retired teacher, I always encourage girls to go to school. Sometimes I see girls in the village being sent from school having failed to pay fees, I assist where I can,” she says.
Maliwichi’s life is an interesting and dramatic ‘plot’. Her past intertwines with the present in a not-sofamiliar manner.
Maliwichi studied for a Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Malawi, Chancellor College where she graduated in 1977.
Coincidentally, President Chakwera was one of her classmates.
“I was taking several units of English, and others in public administration and political science. The President was a classmate in one of the English units I was taking,” she beams.
Having taught at several secondary schools across the country, an opportunity arose to study for a master’s degree in the United Kingdom. Thereafter, she briefly taught at Lilongwe Teachers’ College before being appointed principal of Blantyre Teachers’ College.
Since the family and her husband Harry, an educationist and medical physiologist, was a lecturer at Kamuzu College of Nursing and later Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources resided in Lilongwe then, she decided to retire and join MCHS as College Registrar to be with the family.
