These two rhetoric questions best creates us the rapport that we need to stay together through this article: Is Malawi going to be bombed or declared a no aid zone after embarrassing the United Kingdom by declaring their diplomat persona non grata? As the UK is preparing whatever punishment with which it will visit upon Malawi, apart from fear, what is the best and sustainable course of action for Malawians to take?
The background of this is that Malawians are apprehensive after President Bingu wa Munthalika took a bold move to declared Fergus Cochrane-Dyet, a British diplomat persona non grata! The president lost confidence in him after a letter he wrote to his government had leaked. What he wrote as a diplomat was simply unacceptable. He was rude to the president and the nation he was called upon to befriend. He wrote his leaked letter as though he was a local politician in the opposition. After that no sane person would have expected him to work well with the Malawian president. When a similar incident happened with the American envoy to Mexico, the USA government quickly had him resign and replaced with another person.
The British government chose to look at the issue ethnocentrically. Before even Dyet was officially asked to leave the country, Britain made its stance clear that a move to expel its diplomat by the Malawi government would be unacceptable. The gentleman still had full trust and backing of the British government. It did not bother them that Malawi, the host country of the diplomat had lost trust in him. They warned the country that such a move was going to affect what they called a whole range of bilateral issues between the two countries.
On April 26, 2011 when it was announced that Malawi had finally and really expelled the diplomat, Britain swiftly reacted by expelling the Malawi ambassador to Britain and disinviting the Malawi nation from attending the wedding of their prince. The foreign secretary William Hague criticized Bingu governance and ordered that all bilateral issues between Britain and Malawi should be reviewed.
Following to that the USA and the EU gave Malawi a warning. Their message was to the effect that they were watching the developments over the issue.
Now that this has happened and warnings are being issued even from the UN, the people in Malawi don’t know what will happen of them. They fear the worst for their country; they are afraid Malawi can be what they are calling Libyad or Zimbambwed. Which means Malawi can be punished as Zimbabwe was with assaults on its economy or with bombs as Libya is being pounded by Nato forces.
Are Malawians justified to be afraid? The answer to that question is a resounding ‘yes.’
There are several reasons why we can say Malawians are justified to live in fear right now. It is always overwhelming when you are placed in a situation whereby you don’t know what will happen to you or of you. To make matters worse is when all that you are getting are premonitions of unpleasant things to come. Warnings are coming from left, right and center. There is no message of support so far from any of the friends Malawi has. All the people are being told is to prepare for the harsh realities that come with standing up against a major donor.
What make things even scarier is the nature and the history of aid. Donors use it as a way of maintain their influence within the receiving states. Malawi had had it hard in the past when it stood up against Denmark and a number of other occasions when Germany, UK, USA and other countries decided to cut their aid to Malawi. Canada decided to cut aid to Malawi when the country needed the aid the most and when the projects they were assisting with were doing great. Geoffrey York in his article Banned Aid, Saturday's Globe and Mail, Saturday, May. 30, 2009 quotes Maxwell Matewere and Emma Kaliya as follows:
“We've been able to see the results – the gap between boys and girls has been reduced,” Maxwell Matewere said, adding, “Canada is pulling out at a time when Malawi needs it most. It was really contributing to our achievements.”
Maxwell Matewere, executive director of a children's-rights group called Eye of the Child, has worked on a CIDA project that trains teachers to help girls stay in school.
“It's very abrupt and sudden, and no proper reason was given. I was very shocked. I was more or less jumping out of my chair. In the spirit of accountability and transparency, which the West is always preaching to us, they should be prepared to explain why they are leaving.” said Emma Kaliya of the Canadian aid cut. Emma is a chairwoman of an independent Malawian organization that had worked on women's-rights issues with Canadian aid.
Another thing is when you think that Malawi is poverty stricken, disaster frequented, epidemic prone, Land locked, mineral deficient, soils not so fertile, tobacco reliant, population illiterate etc; it just makes it difficult to take in the prospects of losing a reliable friend in those areas to a place where she can be a deadly foe if not your friend. It is hard to see the escape route.
Economically the UK is years ahead of Malawi and they hold a strong position of influence within all the economic regulating bodies on the globe. The last thing that a nation like Malawi would want to have not as a friend or as a foe is a nation with such influence and power.
There are so many Malawians living and studying in the UK and there are others who aspire to go to the UK for the same. The question is, are they going to be affected?
There is simply a lot at stake running in people’s heads in Malawi. They are genuinely afraid.
However, genuine as the fear maybe, it is about time Malawi had grown up as a nation and start walking the path towards being self reliant. The country has been independent for nearly fifty years now. To be where the country is as an independent nation people lost their lives. It is unethical for Malawians today to give away their birth right as a nation to donors.
By being comfortable with being over dependent on donors Malawi is giving away among other things sovereignty, originality and consistency in development, growth and security.
Most of the people that hold key positions in government now are born frees; that means they were born after the country got independence in 1964. The climate that they have grown in is what I would call the neocolonial matrix. It is next to impossible for them, in their independence to imagine a Malawi that is truly sovereign, a Malawi that is bold enough to accept aid as aid and not as a tool be controlled or manipulated.
Like in the movie ‘the matrix,’ we need to take the red pill to see the other side of reality other than the colonial matrix that we have been subjected to since independence.
For those who have not watched the movie, the story line is intriguing. The plot sets out with humanity being taken over by artificial intelligent machines. Neo is contacted by freedom fighters who explain to him that reality as he understood it is actually a simulation of the real world that only exist in the minds of those who are connected to the matrix.
Unless one is been freed from the Matrix they believe that is real while the machines use them as an energy source. The leader of the freedom fighters, Morpheus, believes Neo is canl lead humanity to freedom and overthrow the machines. Here is part of the dialogue the two hard:
Morpheus: The Matrix is everywhere, it is all around us. Even now, in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window, or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work, or when go to church or when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.
Neo: What truth?
Morpheus: That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else, you were born into bondage, born inside a prison that you cannot smell, taste, or touch. A prison for your mind… Unfortunately, no one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself. This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back.
(In his left hand, Morpheus shows a blue pill.)
Morpheus: You take the blue pill and the story ends. You wake in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. (a red pill is shown in his other hand) You take the red pill and you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes. Remember -- all I am offering is the truth, nothing more.
(Neo takes the red pill and swallows it with a glass of water)
Instead of whining and lamenting over rotten spilt milk, Malawians need to cease the opportunity and free themselves from the colonial matrix and have a go at a life free of donor manipulation. The only difference between Malawi and the UK is that in the UK a driver can tell you how far a full tank can take you and in Malawi, a driver can tell you how far an empty tank can take you. The country has a lot of educated young men and women, our driver that if they can properly channel their knowledge and energies, they would be able to win for this country.
To conclude this here is an inspiring quote from Marianne Williamson, A Return To Love:
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
Marianne Williamson, A Return To Love: Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles, Harper Collins, 1992. From Chapter 7, Section 3 (Pg. 190-191).
If the UK chooses to go, let them go. Malawi cannot be blamed for the broken relationship. Looking at the kind of help Britain has been giving to Malawi, it will be a massive blow but there is no way the nation can continue with its nationhood philosophy formed around donor aid. That is wrong. William Hague, David Cameron etc are no more human than the rest of us just because they have a bit more than us. We are better off obliterated on the map of this earth than to sit and live under such a notion.
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