Your Excellency, a Pule, unto you we address this epistle.
We, who live here in the lowest rung of the social ladder are not in the habit of writing letters to people in high offices because we don’t want to be misunderstood as beggars and mere attention-seekers.
However, there are times, like these times, that we feel obliged to write on behalf of the many Malawians that don’t have a platform to be heard, and on our own behalf.
Your Excellency, in the past four years we have seen and appreciate all the attempts at developing us, but we verily and plainly say unto you, Your Excellency, the attempts are not enough.
If we were asked the Trumpian question: Are you better off than you were four years ago? The majority would say no. The general bottom rung population in this country, the voting corps, is depressed, disappointed, dejected, frustrated and pessimistic; whence the negativity you seem to observe.
We, the people who voted for the Tonse Alliance feel short-changed, tinabetsa voti, because we feel the great promises the Tonse Alliance made during the 2020 presidential election campaign will never materialise. Our enemies, the people who did not want the DPP and UDF alliance to go, feel vindicated that we were promised the moon, stars, and the hot sun. They are now laughing at us.
Your Excellency, most of us in the bottom rung were happy to hear you promise us a Malawi where all of us would be treated equally and have equal access to opportunities. But, the truth on the ground is that some of us have had no opportunity at all in the past 48 months.
Graduate children of the bottom rung have been unable to find employment, not even an internship place in the public service. How do children of bottom rung miss on every shortlist, even for police officer recruitment? Why are the children of people in the topmost rung found on every list?
Even trained teachers and nurses have been languishing haplessly at home. Yet, we all know that the Malawi public health service sector alone has an over 52 percent vacancy rate. Almost 40 percent of vacancies in local councils are unfilled. Malawi has vacancies. Why are people not being employed? These are part of the one million jobs your Excellency promised.
All we have heard and seen are public lectures about how to become entrepreneurs and job-creators. We are told to change our attitudes, mindset, be more hopeful and creative and less cynical. We wonder why the public lecturers themselves don’t create the jobs and become entrepreneurs.
Your Excellency, you might have heard Catholic bishops cry out on behalf of the bottom rung people that “pa ground sipali bwino” and ours Bagamoyo. They were not joking. Prices of goods and services have skyrocketed and have become unaffordable. Electricity, water, data, and mobile phone services are very expensive. Munaonapo anthu akuotcha ma K20? Zilibe ntchito.
Your Excellency, the situation on the ground is just hopeless and negative. Ntherandi, a Pule, Malawi enafe sakutikomera.
Those among us who saw the good side of the Kamuzu Banda government expected some of his approaches to be improved on. The Ministry of Works should get back to repairing our rural and urban road networks.
Right now, township roads in Blantyre, Lilongwe and Mzuzu look like we have just emerged from a Gaza war. Right now, our cities are so filthy. We wonder why the Kamuzu era cleanliness cannot be brought back.
Your Excellency, when you visit Blantyre, just walk down from Sanjika to Chilomoni Market, M’bwelera, Gadaga, Chatha and other places unannounced, and see for yourself the filth in our midst. And, this fuel issue. We buy, where does the money go? You have eight months. Funso ndi lomwelija: Are we better off now than we were in four years ago?
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