Off the wall of Charles Simango: All learners wore shoes on Trump’s visit to Malawi school
It is on days like these that I get to remember how blessed I was to work with such remarkable and beautiful minds as Hardy Nyirenda’s and Dingi Chirwa’s.
After an event like the one below, whoever we would send to cover the Melania Trump function would come back and share the usual banter of who did what, where – no notes, nothing, just chit-chat. Then the following day you would walk into the newsroom to find Hardy quietly hunched over on his chair, combing through the day’s newspapers. He would not say much but after he was done, he would walk over to me and throw the paper on my desk
“We got our lead. I knew they would miss it,” he would say, pointing at a particular page or picture. One look at the item and I would know exactly what he meant.
If it was Dingi’s find, you would walk in to find him punching away on that tiny 128 MB Mac LC Desktop (yap, we produced an entire paper on a meagre 128MB toy of a computer in those days!).
‘I have a lead Bwana,” he would say without much of a glance from the screen, pointing at the picture on the folded page beside him. One look and, yeah, we have a lead.
Being a weekly publication, keeping The Democrat attractive was hard work considering we had to compete and outdo two, daily publications that had the advantage of publishing stories as they happened. That meant we had to learn to find nuggets of diamond where others had already dug and dredged if we were to remain relevant. And somehow, we learnt to look at the same things and see what others could not see.
And so on this Friday, today, The Democrat’s story on Melania’s visit to this school would not be on the school or Melania. It would be on the shoes – all the children are wearing shoes. And that is odd. Nothing wrong with school children wearing shoes. But not these children. We know because we were these children, growing up, and we still see ourselves in this particular type of school children. Most of them do not wear shoes. Maybe it was a donation that was made a long time ago by some program that we did not know of. Or may be they just got them before this occasion. But whatever the circumstances, the fact remains that on this day, it is the shoes that are talking. Everything else in the picture looks normal. Except for the shoes.
And so we would follow the story of how ALL the children came to wear shoes for Melania Trump – or maybe not for her. But on this day, our headline would simply be AND THEY ALL WORE SHOES and the sub-text would read: ‘Thank You Melania’ (assuming they are wearing it for the first time).
There are times when people ask me ‘why can’t you restart The Democrat?’ And I am always like, ‘you don’t get it, it can’t be done’. And they’ll be like, ‘why not? Just put a team together and that’s it.’ No. That’s not it.
You see, The Democrat was not a paper, in the sense of a physical newspaper. It was an abstract of sorts, a convergence of minds. It was like the 1989 Malawi National Team. Kinnah Phiri would soar into the air amid the Zambian defenders, poised to head home that corner kick but, at the very last moment, he would duck his head and, somehow, the ball would find itself on the nimble feet of Barnett Gondwe, behind him, who would tap it into the far right corner of the net. Yet Kinnah never turned, not even once, to check where Barnet Gondwe was positioned. He just knew. Just as Barnet knew that Kinnah would not butt it in. It was a connection of minds.
Damn! I miss you guys, miss my team. Especially today. But as they say, there will always be days like these. I hate that saying.
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I know Simango from the Democrat days but I can bet my last coin such a mediocre story couldn’t find space in his tabloid. Charles, I know Malawi is very poor but to suggest that no single govt primary school class in the capital Lilongwe can afford the luxury of having all its students wearing shoes is taking our poverty to extreme levels. Even if indeed some wore it for the first time what is wrong with that if they were appearing before the most powerful first lady in the world? I am even at pains to believe that a well wisher sponsored the shoes for that event, my gut feeling is that the parents tried all their best to buy or borrow from relatives and friends to make their children look smart for the event just as we prepare our kids when they are going to a church service or wedding. In such event parents try everything to match their kids with the rest of the group because it is not only traumatising to them but their kids as well if they are the odd one out. Its unfortunate the picture isn’t clear when zoomed to see if all the shoes were in good condition to be worn for Melania’s eyes!
Miss them too………and Raphael Tentani! When you lower standards of education and competition so every Jim and Jack can claim a certificate, a degree, a doctorate or a professorship, you shall have to accept serious levels of mediocrity! All you have to do is listen to articulation of issues and insistence to be called by our so-called titles and you know we are an embarrassment to ourselves.
Once again, Thank you Charles Simango.
Hardy, Dingi , Charles ……size yanu siyikupezekabe mMalawi
That’s what happens when you mix Malawians without looking at tribes, without bringing in quota. The best Malawians at the Democrat is all that you were. Miss reading articles like these.
Those guys were really genieus
True legends. Why is it that everything in Malawi seem to be sliding backwards? We need to accept that we have a very big problem. Only when we accept it, will we be able to mobilize ourselves to solve it. It is so disheartening that it is our leaders who see progress when there is none. We have a president who unashamedly claims to be taking Malawi from poverty to prosperity when it is himself, his wife and cronies who are experiencing that prosperity through looting and all sorts of dubious means.
Where we had an enviable education system, we have a system in intensive care; where we had ethical, professional, inquisitive, passionate journalists, we have a bunch of masquerades who would sell their souls for a few dollars; where we had a skilled, passionate, hardworking national team, we have eleven comedians masquerading as flames to put it in Kachinziri’s words; where we had a dedicated, hardworking public sector, we have demotivated, lazy looters in the public service; where Escom, Admarc and many public institutions were for the people, they are now vehicles for looting public resources while the perpetrators are left scot-free; where we had rail and ports only God knows what is there and we continue to complain we do not have durable roads when we are overusing them; where people used to build according to town plans, we have clowns building whatever and wherever they like; where we had public parks in our cities, they have either been sold or left unattended. We had cleaner cities back then than this time yet there were no charities like Beautify Malawi. Soche Hill used to be a beauty to watch. Chitawira, Kanjedza, Nkolokosa clean townships not to mention of Sunnyside, Nyambadwe and places like that. Our neighbouring countries have taken our ideas to develop their countries while we had been sleeping all along.
Pointing at a newly built road is not enough measure for development as our leaders would want us believe. What we should ask ourselves is hard we carried on at the rate we were with Kamuzu, where would we have been? Compare that to what we have achieved. Only by doing that can one convince me that we have progressed. I always tell people that we have been in multiparty democracy for 24 years and Kamuzu ruled Malawi for 30 years, even if we accomplished just half of his accomplishments in 30 years which to be fair we should do in 15 years, we would be somewhere.
Part of our problem is that most of us do not think beyond our borders. Malawi is a very small country, but it is part of a very large continent on which many inspiring activities are taking place. Most of us are unaware that Dr Denis Mukwege of Congo has just been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his struggle to end rape as a weapon of war. His work has been acknowledged by the world. He is an African hero and a role model for all of us, and especially for our children. Our continent is full of heroes, but we ignore them. We are more concerned with exposing the feet of clay of our less than heroic countrymen.
The policy of divide and rule worked well for the European colonizers of Africa, and it is still at work today. The most divisive barriers that we have to overcome are not the barriers at our borders. They are the barriers in our heads. Outsiders are quick to point out our failures, but where are the sons and daughters of our soil to proclaim our successes to us, and to the world?
Until we embrace our Pan-African identity, we will remain the Albania of Africa.
Very true indeed.
Oh yes, We miss the Democrat.
Whether it was newspaper, tabloid or whatever you call it. It was just the best in class.
It was in its own world. As you said the Hardy, Dingi and Charles Simango you rocked.
You gave us good time.
Those guys did gave us good time with the Malawi Democrat later known as The Democratic. Their feature articles or stories were woven in good English … with illustrations that left readers in stitches of laughter. Its editorial team referred the paper as the giant of the street. Nice that Charles Simango has surfaced here.
Genius of a writer, that’s you Charles Simango! And Hardy and Dingi were truly geniuses too! May their souls continue resting in eternal peace…
Nostalgic!!
Cant help it but laugh……befitting headline if you come to think of it.
Keep it on mkwasu……..you’ve made my day.
I don’t understand your angle Charles Simango. What is it that you’re communicating to the readers. On a different note, I find it odd that our president was condemning handouts from the West as stumbling block to Africas (and by extension Malawi) development. Here we have Melania visiting a school that US sponsored and built (it doesn’t look like the dollars were effectively spent though). The need for US intervention was made in the context of the govt failing to build enough schools for its children who desperately need decent classrooms. Mr President, my question is; if the US did not fund the construction of the school with a handout, how else would the pupils been learning? under a tree? Is that your idea of education investment for your fellow Malawians?
Miss your writing and miss the departed Hardy, indeed those were the days when reading newspapers, especially The Democrat was exciting. And I can honestly say there has never been such another.
We have a lead too. Are you sure Kinnah and Bannet played in the national team in 1989. A simple journalistic research costing K21 to ask Garry Chirwa the lineup in 1989 and you wouldnt embarass yourself with your ignorance on Malawi National Team.
I also wondered. Kinnah didn’t play in in 1989 against Zambia. It was much earlier than that
Give the guy a break! He wanted to write 1979
Spot on. Just a typing mistake.