Kondwani Munthali -Malawi

Aid has remained a contentious topic, here at home in Malawi and anywhere in the West or East. Western Governments rush to pull the plug on aid whenever a scandal breaks out, not because of the critical look at the issues, but die to the associated headlines in their local media. In the United Kingdom, the coalition Government is cutting benefits by almost £3billion which simply means, some of the free services the British poor were getting will be chopped or numbers of beneficiaries reduced. The opposition Labour is crying out loud that the gap between the poor and the rich is widening and that the ruling Tory and Lib dems policies are not covering the majority working class. One would be a fool to keep on waiting for the UK to deliver its aid to another country in similar fashion a before. The end of the cold war and the 2007 financial crisis should have served all developing countries a wake up call and change the way we do business. Malawi, like a majority of other Afri...

Everyone has been left with one question, is it really true nobody knows where the missing Malaysian Airlines Flight MH370 is? The answer is yes and no. Yes to the fact that the civilian population really does not know where the plane disappeared to. The NO is that the military establishments of United States of America, China and others like Vietnam, Philippines, India and possibly Turkey and Israel they have an idea or possible location of the plane. The whole razzmatazz is about politics and intelligence. The Malaysian Government will not survive long, confidence will wane and more importantly its image has shaken to the core. They have to democratize quick enough to restore the confidence of its own population. Thats the real cost to Malaysia. But what about the other countries? The challenge is that the area is of vital political, military and intelligence interests to all major powers. It was the scene of the World Wars, Vietnam war and eventually the Cold War! Who ...

Once upon a time,we all looked at United Democratic Front as a party of terror. Stories of late Luke Hara's Mercedes targeting Brown Mpinganjira, of Gwanda Chakuamba and Dr. Hetherwick Ntaba running for their dear lives in Kasungu, of late Chief Wimbe taught a few lessons by notorious Zimba, the story of Sheikh Bugidad a target of then Jangiya. The list of violence was never ending. Everyday, a new democratic Malawi saw fear replacing openness and darkness slowly descending that people no longer trusted their politicians, political systems and resorted to silence. In 2005, on 5th February exactly President Bingu wa Mutharika ditched the UDF, every Malawian celebrated the same. The majority thought the UDF had provided enough lessons to what not to do in a democracy. When UDF partnered with MCP in the 2009 General elections, it was the "party of rapists and murderers joining the party of death and darkness" according to the late Chakufwa Chihana in 1993. People resor...