Kapito at it again: Calls on Malawians to rise up
Fierce government critic John Kapito has called on Malawians to rise up and stand for their economic rights for a better life, maintaining his controversial call for the Joyce Banda administration to step down.
Kapito, who has been making headlines for asking President Banda to resign, again made his case on Capital Radio’s Straight Talk program monitored by Nyasa Times on Tuesday evening that many Malawians are worse off today -economically.
The chairperson of Consumers Association of Malawi (CAMA) maintained his call that if government can’t fix the economic problems facing the country, then it should abdicate from office.
“When government has failed anywhere in the world, people champion, people stand up, rise against that government… There is nothing that will take government down apart from economic and social rights,” said the top consumer advocate.
“I have gone in so many rural areas and have seen the suffering and the pain that people are going through. People are crying out,” said Kapito.
He said the current leaders running the government can be pushed out of power by the people.
“They are not anointed from God. They are the people that were elected to do a specific function and if they have failed to perform that function, we say go out,” he said.
A stitch in time
Kapito, who not long ago was head of state-funded Malawi Human Rights Commission, said a stitch in time saves nine and that government should be held accountable now and not when things are out of control.
“Everybody clapped hands for Bingu wa Mutharika to a point when things started getting worse. We were unable to stand-up to challenge him,” he said.
He said government should listen to different voices and not only the praise singers and cheer leaders.
“A lot of people are still clapping hands. Are we going to wait until when we have been taken to the graveyard so that we can begin to say this government can be held accountable,” said Kapito.
State House has said it is wrong to expect the myriad problems that accumulated for three years to disappear within four months.
Presidential press secretary Steve Nhlane asked Malawians to appreciate the good things that Banda’s government has done to better the lives of Malawians.
‘Comparing the dead and corpse’
Kapito insisted the Banda administration “has not done enough and they are not doing enough to make our lives better and if they can’t do that, then what we are saying, in any democracy please move out.
“They don’t seem to understand issues of economy; they don’t seem to understand the pain Malawians are going through.”
Kapito also criticised the government for advocating for austerity measures when the President and her Cabinet ministers are still enjoying the best privileges.
He said the ‘privileged sector’ in government should share the pain with the people “who are going through hell.”
Presenter of Straight Talk, Rhodes Msonkho fast emerging as Malawi’s Stephen Sackur (who presents HARDtalk on BBC) asked Kapito to compare the administration of late Mutharika and that of the incumbent Banda. He said it would be comparing “dead body and a corpse.”
“Bingu administration was the worse but we have gone into the worse pan as well,” said Kapito
During his tenure of office at MHRC, Kapito invited the wrath of the government which appointed him as he continued to stand firm against what he considered to be violations of peoples’ rights.
At one point, Mutharika accused Kapito of trying to unseat him.
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