At a time when every sector of Malawi is groaning under the weight of social, economic and governance atrocities perpetrated by the current administration, one would expect a thunderous opposition voice shaking the corridors of power. Instead, the nation is confronted by a silence so loud it has become an indictment in itself — the silence of the Malawi Congress Party (MCP).
This is a country haunted once again by the resurfacing of mysterious killings of persons living with albinism. A country where police investigations into murder are increasingly theatrical, compromised, and disturbingly clear cover ups. A country where maize farmers are economically strangled, robbed of dignity and fairness, while opaque and secretive government deals see maize imported from Zambia without full disclosure of costs to the public.
It is a Malawi where constitutionalism has been reduced to a slogan — where politically motivated arrests are carried out with impunity, the Bill of Rights trampled upon without shame, and state power weaponised against perceived opponents. A Malawi where so-called “cost-cutting measures” mask tribally motivated purges in public institutions, only to be followed by the quiet replacement of dismissed workers with politically and tribally convenient appointees.
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It is a Malawi suffocating under barbaric and irrational taxation imposed on an already desperate citizenry, while senior political figures issue reckless and irresponsible public statements that further erode national cohesion. A Malawi whose leadership seems obsessed not with fixing the present, but with erasing the political record of its predecessor, as if history itself were the problem.
And yet — amid all this rot — the MCP is quiet.
Instead of occupying its noble constitutional space as a vigilant opposition force; instead of aligning its voice with the millions of suffering Malawians; instead of exposing the crookedness, bias and gross incompetence of this administration, the MCP has retreated into political hibernation. Its senior members appear more invested in underground factional manoeuvres than in national rescue.
Rather than confronting state failure, they are busy instigating regional and district party structures into rebellion — not against bad governance, but against their own party president. Calls for an early convention dominate internal whispers, while the country burns.
What makes this dereliction even more tragic is that it comes immediately after a general election that should have taught painful but necessary lessons. Malawians voted in anger — abstract, emotional, misdirected anger — driven by the belief that the MCP administration had become detached from reality and had betrayed the spirit of the 2020 revolution in favour of personal enrichment. Many abstained from voting. Others were misled into revolt without clarity of consequence.
Yet the MCP’s NEC seems to have learnt nothing.
Instead of rebuilding credibility as a disciplined, people-centred opposition, it has abandoned its national duty in favour of petty power struggles born from a deeply flawed National Convention that left the party fractured, disjointed and bleeding. The party went into the last polls cracked from within — and today, those cracks have widened into dangerous fault lines.
From the piercing eyes of the black cock, one truth is unmistakable: there is a profound disconnect between the MCP’s upper leadership and the lived realities of ordinary Malawians. While some NEC members obsess over the illusion of a “quick fix” through leadership replacement, villagers across the country whisper a different story — one of regret, reflection and political awakening.
These are Malawians who now openly say they acted in blind anger. Malawians who absconded from voting, who instigated revolt without understanding the alternative, and who today can clearly appreciate the vision they once rejected. Ironically, while party elites plot succession, the grassroots quietly yearn for the return of the same man in 2030.
The question now confronting the nation is brutal but unavoidable:
Is the MCP still a strong institution capable of resisting the greedy ambitions of powerful individuals within its ranks? Or was the chaos and misconduct of its last National Convention the unmistakable symptom of an irreversible rot?
If the latter is true, then Malawians must come to terms with a painful reality — that this once mighty party may no longer be the refuge of hope in times of national crisis.
History is unforgiving to parties that choose silence when the people are screaming. And if the MCP continues to sleep while the house is on fire, it should not be surprised when Malawians stop calling for it to wake up — and start looking elsewhere for rescue.