JZU Tembo says ‘indeed it’s an honour’ to see MCP back in power
A retired politician and longest serving leader of opposition John Zenus Ungapake Tembo on Sunday made a rare public appearance when the unveiling ceremony of Malawi Congress Party (MCP) leader Lazarus Chakwera as the country’s sixth President.
Tembo—who twice failed to win the presidency—arrived at the venue holding a cane in his right hand while someone held his left hand to aid his movement.
His niece and former official government hostess during Kamuzu era, Mama Cecilia Kadzamira, was also in attendance at Malawi Square within Umodzi Park in Lilongwe which also hosts Bingu International Convention Centre and The President’s Hotel .
“I am very, very happy to be part of this historic ceremony,” said Tembo who retired from active politics in October 2013 when he was succeeded as Malawi Congress Party (MCP) leader by Chakwera.
“Power has gone back to MCP,” he added.
MCP is Malawi’s founding party and Chakwera’s win brings it back into power after 26 years in opposition.
Tembo said he retired from his position as president of MCP at the convention of the party and handed over the mantle to Chakwera and trusted him to take the party back to power.
“MCP has been a victim of rigging in elections. I am happy this election was credible,” said Tembo.
“It’s indeed an honour to be part of this history,” he said.
Former speaker of Parliament and veteran MCP politician Louis Chimango also said he was filled with joy to see the party back in the seat of power.
He pointed out that MCP is the oldest political party in the country that was stated by very committed politician late Ngwazi Dr Hastings Kamuzu Banda and he laid very solid foundation.
“The solid foundation for MCP is there now and it will continue to be there in the future,” he said.
However, despite that people voted for Chakwera on MCP ticket and symbols, he was torchbearer of the nine-party Tonse Alliance which had UTM Party’s Saulos Chilima as running mate.
MCP was voted out of power in the first post-independence multiparty general elections in May 1994.
Under Kamuzu, MCP operating in a one-party State, had the record of terror, but Chakwera acknowledged that dark past and the struggle that Malawians fought to earn democracy.
In his speech, President Chakwera described the country’s freedom from colonialism and one party system as of no use if the citizens still languish in poverty, tribalism, corruption and other vices.
He said Malawi’s struggle for independence and multiparty democracy was not just to set the people free but also accord them shared prosperity.
“When the founders of Malawi emerged from the womb of the great struggle that birthed our independence in 1964, the dream was not merely for us to be freed from oppression.
“And when their children marched against the one-party state to birth democracy in 1993, the dream was not merely for us to be freed from tyranny,” he said.
“For what use is freedom from oppression if you are a slave to starvation? Of what use is freedom from colonialism if you are a slave to tribalism?
“Of what use is freedom from tyranny if you are a slave of poverty?” wondered Chakwera—a former Malawi Assemblies of God president who quit the pulpit to join active politics in 2013— amid ululation from the mammoth crowd that gathered at the ceremony.
There is much more to be done in the coming years in terms of health, education in as far as infrastructure is concerned and unemployment.
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It is not MCP that won but TONSE alliance! MCP would not have won on its own but thanks to Chilima’s aggressive campaigning and his UTM.
“Power has gone back to MCP” This is all about MCP praises from this renowned master mind of MCP atrocities who misled her niece also in attendance. Keep on repenting; God is indeed so good to have left both of you still alive today.
What happened was nothing but a judicial coup by MCP.
Long live our president, long live all our MCP stalwarts, and long live Malawi Nation
I want to tell the MCP that it wasn’t them alone who won the rerun presidential election, but Saulos Chilima contributed a lot. More credit must go to him. If he was someone else he could have stood by himself, but he didn’t. Today the MCP has started flying its own flag claiming they won. What about UTM? Here are the mistakes the DPP and UDF made. Atupele Muluzi is so ambitious to become the president of Malawi forgetting the winning formula. If Chimuntho Banda was Peter Hitler Mutharika running mate they could have carried the North. DPP and UDF miscalculated the Northerners’ voting pattern. The MCP must undo the laws that they passed of oppressing the Northerners. They must start to mend walls because they might be the one term ruling party. The Northerners have suffered a lot under MCP rule. Any descenting voice from the Northern region was met with brutal force. Arton Chirwa is the founder of MCP not Kamuzu Banda. Kamuzu Banda was invited to lead MCP. During Lazarous Chakwera swearing ceremony some leaders from the MCP started to praise Kamuzu Banda that he was the founder of the MCP. Lazarous Chakwera went to Nkhatabay during his campaign and acknowledged that MCP was founded by Arton Chirwa and invited Kamuzu Banda to lead the MCP. After the Northerners voted for Tonse Alliance the MCP tone now is different. Are you sure you are going make a new Malawi, or you gonna bring back the Young Pioneer gangs that terrorized Malawians. I see this honeymoon short live as some killers that were with DPP will come back to Tonse Alliance to continue torturing Malawians. We the Northerners have been fucked so much by both people from the Centre and Southern region. Enough is enough and all we need is FEDERALISM with rotational presidency among our three regions. Each region must be allocated points according to its population. The Southern region 35 points, Central region 30 points, and Northern region 25 points. For a political party to win the presidency it must have more than 50 points. Each province must be ruled by a governor. The governorship of each province/region must be rotated among the indigenous tribes of that region so that there is no domination by a larger tribe in that region. FEDERALISM is the fight us Northerners are going to give Chakwera and mark my words. The ex President of Malawi, Peter Hitler Mutharika when arrived in Mangochi at his retirement house he was welcomed by people that shouted very hostile language towards Tonse Alliance. I urge all Northerners to leave Mangochi immediately because that is a very hostile place for Northerners. We minority, and I see ethnic cleansing coming. The DPP and UDF have just exposed the dangerous politics of Malawi, and most of these Malawians have swallowed their liars
Za nkutu!
Zopanda pake izu
Za zii, I just wasted my time reading yr article, at least mmpaka pa middle apo, unalembako zanzeru.
Truth be told that if Tembo was heading the Tonse alliance, sitinakamuvotera!!
We salute our new leaders: let the work begin. Malawi wokomera TONSE.
MCP NEC members championed by moreen Bondo should not claim the ownership of victory today because this is a collective efforts from all walks of life.Moreen is a direct cousin to chakwela and should stop dameging chakwelas name.DPP has seen exit door bcoz of the same arogancy
Give us the evidence, we’ll happily oblige
Skc can you also take john tembo to the Hague? This man took so many lives and should not be receiving red carpet treatment
I dont believe Chakwera really grew up in the rural village as he says; if its true then he is a traitor; Coming from the rural village and celebrate abolishing of education access quota does not make sense. Shame.
I am not really following your argument. Would you please care to elaborate?
We need to start having sober conversations on fora like this so we can help build a new, better, inclusive Malawi. We have the skills and capacity, we just need the will and patriotism required to move forward. The conduct of the fresh presidential elections is just one good example of this.
To put it in perspective, I am from the North and I just happened to be one of the second batch of people that started getting affected by the quota system way back in 1991. In those days, they decided to introduce a system called ‘Non-residential Students’. This simply meant, if you qualified for entry into university and the quota for your district has been filled up, you still got selected to attend university, but at your own expense regarding accommodation and meals. On it’s own, the system seemed simple enough, but the main challenge was that finding safe and good accommodation in Malawi (Zomba for example) was no mean feat – this owing to the fact that in those days the property industry was not well developed (not sure for now though).
But since we wanted to get an education, our parents made sure they helped us (at a huge extra expense) so we could still go and attend college.
Quota system is as bad as tribalism in my view. This is simply because it seemed to target people from one region. I could be wrong. On the other hand, leaving students from other regions or districts because spaces in public university have been taken up by students from one region is equally not acceptable.
Quota system is not the best way to provide equal opportunities. I do not think, as a parent, depriving one hungry child of food to feed another hungry child solves the problem (excuse my analogy). In that regard, you are still a failure as a parent. What I think might really put us on the right path is to invest more in public and private institutions so we do not exclude anyone. We will then be able to accommodate the huge numbers coming from high (secondary) school.
What we should be aiming at is making sure our public resources are not plundered by unscrupulous leaders. I am sure you will agree that if all the public money that has been squandered in the past had been properly channeled and accounted for, we would have had enough public institutions of higher learning to absorb the alarming figures getting churned through our secondary schools, negating the need for quota system.
I still think quota system was partly being perpetuated to drive a wedge between our regions and tribes because it served the ruling elite better as having that separation kept one region in power because of the numbers. They never really cared whether they got votes from the north or not as they would still win. You will agree, that that was the sentiment – we do not need votes from the north and the like.
In short, quota system is like applying ‘band aid’ (sticky plaster) to attach a broken car suspension spring (if ever that could work). We need long lasting solutions.
Just a thought.
Are we commenting on the article above or we are off line?
I think my brethren are offline. Let us build the new Malawi. If Peter Mutharika was president in one party system, I just can’t imagine where Malawi could have been today, theft, tribal wars etc, so please let
us forget about the past and strive to build the new Malawi