Banda celebrates her life journey in first 100 days as President
As she clocks 100 days of Presidency, Mrs Joyce Banda on Friday celebrated her life by looking at the journey that has taken her to the present position.
The first part of the celebrations took place at Comesa Hall in Blantyre under the theme ‘Unity, Equity and Development, a better Malawi is possible by looking at her initiatives before attaining presidency’.
“I see the grace of God in me because he has done wonders in my life,” said Banda in her brief statement.
“ I believe that if we could all do something about the less privileged, the country would progress tremendously,” she added.
No ordinary woman
In her remarks, Njoki Wainaina, the president’s friend from Kenya described Banda as a giant woman of Africa.
“ Joyce Banda is not an ordinary woman,” said Wainaina.
Wainaina thanked God for taking Banda through a journey she described as difficult but has helped to prepare her for today’s challenges.
“Malawi is in good hands because God already prepared her for today’s role,” she said.
She also thanked the First Gentleman, Chief Justice Richard Banda, retired, for his support to the president.
“Richard is a man who is not afraid of women empowerment. Men should not be afraid of women because we will always honour you,” Wainaina said.
Long road to leadership
In 1990, Joyce Banda established the National Association of Business Women (NABW) to uplift the socio-economic status of women in Malawi and currently has 20 thousand members.
The Hunger Project was also established by her in 1999 to eradicate hunger and is currently in 6 districts in the central and southern region where it has successfully established rural growth centres.
Apart from the Joyce Banda Foundation which is a private school, she also has Joyce Banda Foundation International that supports Market Movement Initiative (Mwai) and Youth Movement for Development (YOMODE) which has membership of over 100 thousand and 700 thousand respectively.
The foundation also promotes education by providing free secondary school education in Domasi at Sigalila, it provides scholarships to 2,500 secondary school students and recently gave scholarships to 200 university students.
In 2001, the president started the African American Business Women Alliance to boost trade between the two continents.
The event was graced by statements and performances by all the groups the president is associated with.
The President also presented a cheque of K3.1 million to 31 groups of MWAI and 40 thousand chicks to be distributed to women groups.
Joyce Banda became the President of the Republic of Malawi on 7 April, 2012 following the demise of former President, Professor Bingu wa Mutharika who died of cardiac arrest. Banda becomes the first female president in Malawi but second female President in Africa.
