Tuesday, March 06, 2007
Valentine
VALENTINE
By
By
Patrick Achitabwino
A battered dirty pail lay desolate at a corner, leaning against a mosquito-blood smeared wall. It was dead hot and springs of urine were snaking over the rugged floor, meandering into all directions.
Maliko staggered as he fell onto the floor, the poisonous smell of sweat, human waste, and urine and armpits dogging his nostrils. The long arms of the law severed all ties of his liberty at a watering hole, just as he was guzzling one bottle of Carlsberg Green after another, letting the sour drink pour into his throat as if it was chasing with it all the problems of his life.
“You have a right to remain silent,” a muscular built police officer, bullet headed, warned him as a handcuff married his arms together. “Whatever you say will be used against you in a court of law.”
He thought of protesting but the moment the butt of a gun brushed his chest, all the energy and courage escaped. A charge sheet was read out to him at the police station. He was under police custody for unlawful wounding.
In the cell he was almost deaf. All the inmates were half naked, others dressed only in underwears, resting their skeletal bodies on the floor. A leader had to say ‘turn right’ and in unity they all did. The smell of the meal that was served bundled out all the interest of appetite in him. Weevils could be seen spicing the beans as the nsima was a step too close to porridge.
A pain in the chest crawled his mind to the genesis of the long journey. Zione, a slender, milk-teeth lady he had just engaged angrily bulleted her way into his office, tears cascading down her cheeks. She looked grossly unfamiliar, a total stranger, like a mad woman on the street who yells at passers by.
“Cheater, crook…,” she stammered as she was shivering with anger. She threw a newspaper on his desk then sped out of the office.
“Zio, please…,” Maliko had his hands elevated as if lost in the midst of a prayer. Zione was nowhere close for comfort.
He grabbed the phone then quickly dialed her.
“This marks the end… Thank you for all the pains, proceed with your valentine,” Zio said then hang the phone. He called her many a times and finally she switched off the phone.
He walked out of the office, loosened his neck tie, looked left then right. He started walking anyhow. He found himself at the rusty gate of Mapanga City Park. He strolled past it, paused a moment then proceeded. He could not even hear whistling birds that were chatting in the trees. All his life needed was to enter into the silence of the park, step over grassy springs, and look at the trees, the birds, the sky, hands in pockets.
“You said you love me but you lied,” faintingly he heard a voice from no where. He lazily opened his eyes, swung 360 degrees to trace the source of the voice, but there was nobody close. A salamander lizard stood on a tree nearby, gazing at him, nodding its head mockingly.
For a moment he thought of tearing the newspaper that was weighing his right hand down. He had met Lusubilo Machaka, the lady at the heart of the controversy, at a party at one of the hotels one night. They shared the same table. She was hilly buttocked with a golden bracelet on her right hand that was matching the long golden earrings. Glittering lipstick that debrissed her small lips brightened her bewitching smile. They talked of their professional life, personal life. They danced to the soft music, tight, shared glasses of wine. It was all love at first sight. They spent a romantic night together at her home.
He later started dribbling her calls. It was either he was busy or the phone was off. He told her straight in the face in her office that he had a girl friend he was engaging in a few days time. She challenged that she did not care of the other woman. Or even if they would be two women it would be fine with her.
She dropped a bomb a month later. She sent him an e-mail that she was pregnant.
“I am too young to impregnate a woman,” angrily he told her on the phone.
“Who told you,” she spat back venom.
“I underwent an operation when I was young and the doctor said I can never father a kid,” he was sweating.
“The doctor was wrong,” she cut the line.
Maliko called again but there was no response.
He thought of Zione, the first woman his life had ever loved. They had been in love for five years. They met in the second year at Chikangawa University. He was studying law as she was pursuing business administration.
She had always been kind to him even during the university days. The night he lost his mobile phone at one of the bottle stores in Chibanja township she surrendered hers to him. Her generosity climaxed the moment he lost his first job as an attorney with Luwinga and Company law firm. She used to give him half of her salary for the six months he was jobless. Their affair had blessings of parents of both sides.
Their engangement was colourful, held in the spacious multi purpose hall in Blantyre. Parents relived their youthful days, dancing to the envy of youngsters.
“Osatipangisa manyazi achimwene,” he could hear his mother ululating at the top of her voice. She was too excited a woman. For the first time in life, Maliko Butao saw his mother dressed in a trouser and his father in a skirt, white maize flour smeared in their heads. They tossed coins in the air, flapped paper banknotes right from the entrance of the hall up to the front where Maliko and Zione were carrying a basket.
A dread locked inmate awoke Maliko from the long train of his memories. He had a large scar on the forehead, just above the eye. His mouth smelled more tobacco as his teeth had lost the whiteness.
“Jah man, what crime did you commit man?” his language was punctuated with rastafarianism tones.
It was a custom, so Maliko was informed, that whenever a new inmate joins a cell, he confesses the crime committed to his colleagues.
He grabbed a newspaper that was in the right hand of the rasta then flipped the classified ads page. The page was littered with many valentine messages as it was Valentines Day.
“You see this name here?” he was pointing at the newspaper. “This is me.”
The inmates clustered around the newspaper to read about their new colleague. The message read: Maliko Butao, how can I thank God enough for having you in my life. You are more of a piece of gold found in the desert, a spring of joy in my life, a source of inspiration. For I would rather die than lose you. Let the world know that you are mine forever. I am proud to be three months pregnant of you. Lusubilo Machaka.
Maliko swore before his colleagues that Lusubilo had wrecked his life, that Zione had counted herself out of the cobweb of his romance.
“Jah man, does babylon arrest Jah people for impregnating girls?” the rasta aroused laughter in the cell, stabbing a hurriedly rolled cigar between his fat lips.
“You don’t understand rasta,” twin beads of tears rolled down his cheeks. “When Zione smashed the newspaper with the message on my desk I went mad, dead mad. I bought three bottles of bears, quickly drained them then drove to Lusibilo’s house. I smashed her with a bottle on the forehead. I left her bleeding and uncounscious. That is the crime I have committed.”
He knew he would lose his job. Being the programme manager for the Commission for the Advancement of the Rights of Women he had acted unethically. By hurting a woman he had rendered his job useless. His greatest worry was the media. Definitely, his story would be the lead article on the next day.
A battered dirty pail lay desolate at a corner, leaning against a mosquito-blood smeared wall. It was dead hot and springs of urine were snaking over the rugged floor, meandering into all directions.
Maliko staggered as he fell onto the floor, the poisonous smell of sweat, human waste, and urine and armpits dogging his nostrils. The long arms of the law severed all ties of his liberty at a watering hole, just as he was guzzling one bottle of Carlsberg Green after another, letting the sour drink pour into his throat as if it was chasing with it all the problems of his life.
“You have a right to remain silent,” a muscular built police officer, bullet headed, warned him as a handcuff married his arms together. “Whatever you say will be used against you in a court of law.”
He thought of protesting but the moment the butt of a gun brushed his chest, all the energy and courage escaped. A charge sheet was read out to him at the police station. He was under police custody for unlawful wounding.
In the cell he was almost deaf. All the inmates were half naked, others dressed only in underwears, resting their skeletal bodies on the floor. A leader had to say ‘turn right’ and in unity they all did. The smell of the meal that was served bundled out all the interest of appetite in him. Weevils could be seen spicing the beans as the nsima was a step too close to porridge.
A pain in the chest crawled his mind to the genesis of the long journey. Zione, a slender, milk-teeth lady he had just engaged angrily bulleted her way into his office, tears cascading down her cheeks. She looked grossly unfamiliar, a total stranger, like a mad woman on the street who yells at passers by.
“Cheater, crook…,” she stammered as she was shivering with anger. She threw a newspaper on his desk then sped out of the office.
“Zio, please…,” Maliko had his hands elevated as if lost in the midst of a prayer. Zione was nowhere close for comfort.
He grabbed the phone then quickly dialed her.
“This marks the end… Thank you for all the pains, proceed with your valentine,” Zio said then hang the phone. He called her many a times and finally she switched off the phone.
He walked out of the office, loosened his neck tie, looked left then right. He started walking anyhow. He found himself at the rusty gate of Mapanga City Park. He strolled past it, paused a moment then proceeded. He could not even hear whistling birds that were chatting in the trees. All his life needed was to enter into the silence of the park, step over grassy springs, and look at the trees, the birds, the sky, hands in pockets.
“You said you love me but you lied,” faintingly he heard a voice from no where. He lazily opened his eyes, swung 360 degrees to trace the source of the voice, but there was nobody close. A salamander lizard stood on a tree nearby, gazing at him, nodding its head mockingly.
For a moment he thought of tearing the newspaper that was weighing his right hand down. He had met Lusubilo Machaka, the lady at the heart of the controversy, at a party at one of the hotels one night. They shared the same table. She was hilly buttocked with a golden bracelet on her right hand that was matching the long golden earrings. Glittering lipstick that debrissed her small lips brightened her bewitching smile. They talked of their professional life, personal life. They danced to the soft music, tight, shared glasses of wine. It was all love at first sight. They spent a romantic night together at her home.
He later started dribbling her calls. It was either he was busy or the phone was off. He told her straight in the face in her office that he had a girl friend he was engaging in a few days time. She challenged that she did not care of the other woman. Or even if they would be two women it would be fine with her.
She dropped a bomb a month later. She sent him an e-mail that she was pregnant.
“I am too young to impregnate a woman,” angrily he told her on the phone.
“Who told you,” she spat back venom.
“I underwent an operation when I was young and the doctor said I can never father a kid,” he was sweating.
“The doctor was wrong,” she cut the line.
Maliko called again but there was no response.
He thought of Zione, the first woman his life had ever loved. They had been in love for five years. They met in the second year at Chikangawa University. He was studying law as she was pursuing business administration.
She had always been kind to him even during the university days. The night he lost his mobile phone at one of the bottle stores in Chibanja township she surrendered hers to him. Her generosity climaxed the moment he lost his first job as an attorney with Luwinga and Company law firm. She used to give him half of her salary for the six months he was jobless. Their affair had blessings of parents of both sides.
Their engangement was colourful, held in the spacious multi purpose hall in Blantyre. Parents relived their youthful days, dancing to the envy of youngsters.
“Osatipangisa manyazi achimwene,” he could hear his mother ululating at the top of her voice. She was too excited a woman. For the first time in life, Maliko Butao saw his mother dressed in a trouser and his father in a skirt, white maize flour smeared in their heads. They tossed coins in the air, flapped paper banknotes right from the entrance of the hall up to the front where Maliko and Zione were carrying a basket.
A dread locked inmate awoke Maliko from the long train of his memories. He had a large scar on the forehead, just above the eye. His mouth smelled more tobacco as his teeth had lost the whiteness.
“Jah man, what crime did you commit man?” his language was punctuated with rastafarianism tones.
It was a custom, so Maliko was informed, that whenever a new inmate joins a cell, he confesses the crime committed to his colleagues.
He grabbed a newspaper that was in the right hand of the rasta then flipped the classified ads page. The page was littered with many valentine messages as it was Valentines Day.
“You see this name here?” he was pointing at the newspaper. “This is me.”
The inmates clustered around the newspaper to read about their new colleague. The message read: Maliko Butao, how can I thank God enough for having you in my life. You are more of a piece of gold found in the desert, a spring of joy in my life, a source of inspiration. For I would rather die than lose you. Let the world know that you are mine forever. I am proud to be three months pregnant of you. Lusubilo Machaka.
Maliko swore before his colleagues that Lusubilo had wrecked his life, that Zione had counted herself out of the cobweb of his romance.
“Jah man, does babylon arrest Jah people for impregnating girls?” the rasta aroused laughter in the cell, stabbing a hurriedly rolled cigar between his fat lips.
“You don’t understand rasta,” twin beads of tears rolled down his cheeks. “When Zione smashed the newspaper with the message on my desk I went mad, dead mad. I bought three bottles of bears, quickly drained them then drove to Lusibilo’s house. I smashed her with a bottle on the forehead. I left her bleeding and uncounscious. That is the crime I have committed.”
He knew he would lose his job. Being the programme manager for the Commission for the Advancement of the Rights of Women he had acted unethically. By hurting a woman he had rendered his job useless. His greatest worry was the media. Definitely, his story would be the lead article on the next day.
The SMS
THE SMS
By
Patrick Achitabwino
Men, you can never be clever with these gadgets called cell phones. Nokia what, Motorolla what, they all come in different names, with a highly unimaginable power to break marriages at a lightening speed. Not even marriages built on the granite foundations of church oaths have the power to withstand the breaking power of mobile phones.
Imagine, come night I am a slave, praying incessantly that this ‘spare wheel’ whom I met where only the heavens know does not call. Principle number one, turn the phone off the soonest you are home. But I learnt a bitter lesson, the night my uncle passed away at Kumwamba hospital, none of my relatives could get me on my mobile phone. The stupid thing I did was turning it on in the morning when I was too thirsty for two cold ones only to be greeted with a funeral text. Turning phones off at night is bad, too bad men though we men are often left with no choice but to turn these gadgets off.
You see what, at times I believe that all men are fools, forgive my tongue if you are so honest a husband. You know, my neighbour, a grey-bearded school teacher, Che Jalasi had even to formulate and paste a commandment on the head board of his bed. He confided to me over a bottle of Kuche Kuche that it reads: my wife, never touch my phone without my consent.
This other night, my neighbour told me with a smoke stabbed in between his fat lips, that his wife tried to mess up with his phone. Oh, men, Che Jalasi went mad, for a week his tongue never tasted any food cooked by the hands of his wife, let alone bathing the water warned by her. The only thing they did as a family was going to church together on Sunday though they never talked to each other.
You see what, later I learnt that Lucy, my beloved wife for five years, and mother of our two lovely daughters, Ezelyn and Michelle, scans the inbox messages in my phone every night.
It was too hot this night, and by hot, I really mean too hot. I was sweating. I think the sky should have been sweating as well. And as if the sweltering hotness was not a stab in the rib, the rude call of nature threw me out of bed.
Men, guess what? Lucy was strong-eyed, my handset clasped in her hands. She had turned it on and by whose grace did she get the SIM card code I will perhaps leave never to know. I grabbed the phone off her hands. I noted her targets, firstly, messages received and sent; secondly, calls received; and thirdly, frequently called numbers.
I changed my style. If this spare wheel is named Chrissy, I would save her name as Chris or Gladys as Gladwell. I learnt the trick from this church elder friend of mine. These church elders, chat with them over a bottle of wine in some dark spaces, you will learn a lot.
As I sit, with my head buried in my trembling hands as an ostritch that buries its head in the sand, I curse the day I bought a mobile phone. For behold, the heaven is my witness, it has brought much miseries than joy in my life. You will shed tears with me, Lucy is never the same woman she used to be. She will never forgive me and I will never forgive myself.
It is with great pains that I recall what happened. This rude call of nature whisked me out of the house. You know these houses that are only graced with pit latrines. It was raining cats and dogs, as the threatening lightening and thunder kept many a people trembling.
Having relieved myself, I unsuccessfully dribbled past the pouring rain then sped into my house. The moment I stepped my feet into the house I realized something was wrong. Plates had been smashed down, pouring soup was snaking over the carpet. I gazed at my wife, tears were spiraling out of her eyes. She had my mobile phone in her right hand.
I wrestled the phone out of her hand then checked in coming calls so too the inbox. There was no any call received let alone a message. I wondered what broke hell loose. Having found no reason in my brain I rushed into the bedroom, hunger pelting my belly. I closed my eyes in a desperate attempt to woo sleep to catch me down but sleep was no where close.
Faintingly I heard a knock. It was the housemaid. “Madam is breathing restlessly,” she said. For a moment I hesitated. Lazily I walked to the sitting room only to find Lucy down on the floor, unconscious. I sprinkled water over her head but she was no closer to gaining consciousness. Michelle was just crying as there was nobody to breast fed her.
At over a hundred kilometers an hour I cruised to the referral hospital, tears welling in my eyes. White uniformed nurses ushered Lucy into the intensive care unit. For as long as I could remember I did not switch my phone off at night for the first time. I called many people than I can recall. I was there by her bed all night long. At the slightest moment she opened her eyes I smiled but she did not.
“Mr. Machaka,” a spectacled doctor with a stethoscope hanging around his neck stood calmly before me. “Your wife suffered a massive high blood pressure that led to minor stroke. I am afraid to say that the stroke has paralysed her limbs. We will offer her clutches so too a wheel chair.”
As tears spilled out my eyes, so too was Lucy in tears. She was waving me off her bed. She told me it was all over with me. She told me I had crippled all her life dreams. I told her she was the only one and that I could do anything to make her happy.
The morning that followed was a nightmare. Her parents thundered into the hospital, oozing with anger. Her dad shoveled me off the bed. I was lost. I was still unaware of the crime I had committed. Lucy called for my mobile phone and confidently I handed it to her. Then I saw her parents gathering around the phone. I knew something was wrong, their eyes turned blood red. Her dad threw it unto me and ordered me out of the hospital.
Reality caught with me, I had missed the messages outbox. The message that caused the predicament read: “I told you I made a wrong choice. You unmistakably have all the qualities for the woman of my dreams. I cannot wait for long to replace the woman I have with you. Just tell me when you are ready and thy will will be done. Sweetheart.”
God is my witness, I did not author the message. I am a victim of generosity. You know what, this other day I was having a cold one at Thirsty Pub a friend of mine requested to text his girlfriend through my phone. I knew the lady he was to text. She had totally wrecked havoc in his family.
Men, what can I do? Her parents have sworn never to see me. They took her to their home. All my calls are barred. I journeyed there this other day to confess that I was innocent but a flying panga knife missed my neck by the grace of the almighty. I have since stopped attending calls of these spare wheels let alone do I gather courage to propose to them. I am lost. I can not live without Lucy. Memories of the day we stood before the priest and vow that we would be together till death does us part are fresher in my mind. Dear friend, I only hope you will join me in prayer for truth to be out. These cell phones I will live never to treasure them.
By
Patrick Achitabwino
Men, you can never be clever with these gadgets called cell phones. Nokia what, Motorolla what, they all come in different names, with a highly unimaginable power to break marriages at a lightening speed. Not even marriages built on the granite foundations of church oaths have the power to withstand the breaking power of mobile phones.
Imagine, come night I am a slave, praying incessantly that this ‘spare wheel’ whom I met where only the heavens know does not call. Principle number one, turn the phone off the soonest you are home. But I learnt a bitter lesson, the night my uncle passed away at Kumwamba hospital, none of my relatives could get me on my mobile phone. The stupid thing I did was turning it on in the morning when I was too thirsty for two cold ones only to be greeted with a funeral text. Turning phones off at night is bad, too bad men though we men are often left with no choice but to turn these gadgets off.
You see what, at times I believe that all men are fools, forgive my tongue if you are so honest a husband. You know, my neighbour, a grey-bearded school teacher, Che Jalasi had even to formulate and paste a commandment on the head board of his bed. He confided to me over a bottle of Kuche Kuche that it reads: my wife, never touch my phone without my consent.
This other night, my neighbour told me with a smoke stabbed in between his fat lips, that his wife tried to mess up with his phone. Oh, men, Che Jalasi went mad, for a week his tongue never tasted any food cooked by the hands of his wife, let alone bathing the water warned by her. The only thing they did as a family was going to church together on Sunday though they never talked to each other.
You see what, later I learnt that Lucy, my beloved wife for five years, and mother of our two lovely daughters, Ezelyn and Michelle, scans the inbox messages in my phone every night.
It was too hot this night, and by hot, I really mean too hot. I was sweating. I think the sky should have been sweating as well. And as if the sweltering hotness was not a stab in the rib, the rude call of nature threw me out of bed.
Men, guess what? Lucy was strong-eyed, my handset clasped in her hands. She had turned it on and by whose grace did she get the SIM card code I will perhaps leave never to know. I grabbed the phone off her hands. I noted her targets, firstly, messages received and sent; secondly, calls received; and thirdly, frequently called numbers.
I changed my style. If this spare wheel is named Chrissy, I would save her name as Chris or Gladys as Gladwell. I learnt the trick from this church elder friend of mine. These church elders, chat with them over a bottle of wine in some dark spaces, you will learn a lot.
As I sit, with my head buried in my trembling hands as an ostritch that buries its head in the sand, I curse the day I bought a mobile phone. For behold, the heaven is my witness, it has brought much miseries than joy in my life. You will shed tears with me, Lucy is never the same woman she used to be. She will never forgive me and I will never forgive myself.
It is with great pains that I recall what happened. This rude call of nature whisked me out of the house. You know these houses that are only graced with pit latrines. It was raining cats and dogs, as the threatening lightening and thunder kept many a people trembling.
Having relieved myself, I unsuccessfully dribbled past the pouring rain then sped into my house. The moment I stepped my feet into the house I realized something was wrong. Plates had been smashed down, pouring soup was snaking over the carpet. I gazed at my wife, tears were spiraling out of her eyes. She had my mobile phone in her right hand.
I wrestled the phone out of her hand then checked in coming calls so too the inbox. There was no any call received let alone a message. I wondered what broke hell loose. Having found no reason in my brain I rushed into the bedroom, hunger pelting my belly. I closed my eyes in a desperate attempt to woo sleep to catch me down but sleep was no where close.
Faintingly I heard a knock. It was the housemaid. “Madam is breathing restlessly,” she said. For a moment I hesitated. Lazily I walked to the sitting room only to find Lucy down on the floor, unconscious. I sprinkled water over her head but she was no closer to gaining consciousness. Michelle was just crying as there was nobody to breast fed her.
At over a hundred kilometers an hour I cruised to the referral hospital, tears welling in my eyes. White uniformed nurses ushered Lucy into the intensive care unit. For as long as I could remember I did not switch my phone off at night for the first time. I called many people than I can recall. I was there by her bed all night long. At the slightest moment she opened her eyes I smiled but she did not.
“Mr. Machaka,” a spectacled doctor with a stethoscope hanging around his neck stood calmly before me. “Your wife suffered a massive high blood pressure that led to minor stroke. I am afraid to say that the stroke has paralysed her limbs. We will offer her clutches so too a wheel chair.”
As tears spilled out my eyes, so too was Lucy in tears. She was waving me off her bed. She told me it was all over with me. She told me I had crippled all her life dreams. I told her she was the only one and that I could do anything to make her happy.
The morning that followed was a nightmare. Her parents thundered into the hospital, oozing with anger. Her dad shoveled me off the bed. I was lost. I was still unaware of the crime I had committed. Lucy called for my mobile phone and confidently I handed it to her. Then I saw her parents gathering around the phone. I knew something was wrong, their eyes turned blood red. Her dad threw it unto me and ordered me out of the hospital.
Reality caught with me, I had missed the messages outbox. The message that caused the predicament read: “I told you I made a wrong choice. You unmistakably have all the qualities for the woman of my dreams. I cannot wait for long to replace the woman I have with you. Just tell me when you are ready and thy will will be done. Sweetheart.”
God is my witness, I did not author the message. I am a victim of generosity. You know what, this other day I was having a cold one at Thirsty Pub a friend of mine requested to text his girlfriend through my phone. I knew the lady he was to text. She had totally wrecked havoc in his family.
Men, what can I do? Her parents have sworn never to see me. They took her to their home. All my calls are barred. I journeyed there this other day to confess that I was innocent but a flying panga knife missed my neck by the grace of the almighty. I have since stopped attending calls of these spare wheels let alone do I gather courage to propose to them. I am lost. I can not live without Lucy. Memories of the day we stood before the priest and vow that we would be together till death does us part are fresher in my mind. Dear friend, I only hope you will join me in prayer for truth to be out. These cell phones I will live never to treasure them.
Cost of love
THE COST OF LOVE
By
Patrick Achitabwino
The moment the steel gate banged behind my back I knew it was goodbye to the outside world. A sea of eyes congested in an overcrowded cell was tearing me apart. A pungent smell of urine in conspiracy with shit fleeing from the overflooded leadless pot dumped at a corner gave my nostrils the greeting of the cell.
For five years, five solid years, I have to live in this overcrowded cell, see death face to face, struggle with scabies and live on a weeviled-beans meal a day. But why only five years? I am shaking my hornless head. Why was the magistrate so unfair with me so as not to sentence me to life imprisonment? After all, I have nothing to lose; I have had enough of the sorrows of the outside world.
The image of Suzika still lurks at the back of my mind. She had the eyes that defied darkness, sparkling at night. Her round taxina-bottom swayed backwards many a necks of men along the streets. I recall with laughter one day along the streets when vendors nearly provoked her anger. As she was passing by they sung …mainjekishoni akulera…dibwiriyo, dibwiriyo…
We had been married for a year and she had not been blessed to visit the maternity ward any day sooner. What started as a mere stomachache one evening proved fatal and costly to our affair. Doctors diagnosed her with cancer of the womb. She had to be operated, they insisted.
The moment the prosecutor asked me to confess guilty or not guilty, the Chief Executive of Mayoka Town Assembly was astonished to see me pleading not guilty. I was not guilty, I could not be guilty and I will live never to acknowledge that I was guilty.
As I was standing in the dock, face to face with him as a principal witness of the state I drew him back to the morning I banged into his office, sweat dripping on my forehead. I asked him if I had not told him that my wife was wrestling with death at Mangani Private Clinic? That she would not survive if I would not get money to pay for her operation?
The Chief Executive, Che Jalasi as we all used to call him at the office, told the court that the conditions of service of the assembly do not provide for loans in excess of the K100 000 I had requested to people of my grade.
I reminded him that this was a case of life and death. I told him that conditions of service are mere words written by people. I had even challenged him in front of his desk at the assembly, my fist banging the desk, that by public demand a constitution gets amended then how special was a mere conditions of service.
The magistrate, grey haired with his eyes curtained by sunglasses lifted the gravel and hit his table several times to control my temper. They were accusing me of stealing K100 000 from my office. I did not steal, I insisted, on humanitarian grounds I took the money to save the life of my wife.
Infact the day Che Jalasi denied me a loan I rushed to the hospital only to find my wife on a life-supporting machine. She gazed at me once as if saying “why my darling, why not saving my life?”
I recalled that it was the month end and that people had paid rentals to the assembly and to make matters far much better I was the controller of the coffers of the assembly. Early morning I rushed to the office, opened the safe and took K100 000 then rush to the hospital.
“You will have an operation,” I assured my wife. I saw Suzika smiling as nurses were driving her on a stretcher to the theatre.
I kept waiting outside the theatre, fingering my rosary for divine intervention. I could visualize the medical personnel scissoring the belly of my wife, removing the cancerous part, suturing the wounds and driving her out to me. But all that was mere thinking.
A stampede of armed police personnel drove me out of the long train of thoughts. I was under arrest, they told me. I told them the arrest had to wait, the life of my wife was more valuable than the might of the handcuffs. They could not reason. They had much power in their long guns.
“Bayisoni Mayikolo, you will be charged for stealing public money,” a tall CID officer told me at the police station.
“Correction,” I told him. “You will charge me for saving the life of my wife. The only crime I have committed is to come to the rescue of my dying wife”
A band of police officers were astonished, I could read that on their faces. They ushered me into the remand cell that smelt blood. One of the remandees was shot in the leg in a shoot out with the police. He was an armed robber.
A bomb caught me while I was in that cell. A policewoman unbolted the steel gate and took me into another office. God forbid, filled with sympathy she let the cut out of the bag, Suzika was no more.
“Amen..amen…” I had nothing more to say.
In the courtroom the double-edged sword of justice, if indeed it is just, was at the blink of chopping my head.
“Before I pass judgement do you have anything to say?” the magistrate asked me.
I nodded my head and said no.
“You are therefore convicted of theft by public servant…”
I cut the magistrate short. “Objection my lord, convicted of theft by love servant…”
The magistrate hammered the gravel on his table. “Theft by public servant, and I am therefore sentencing you to…”
I could not hear the judgement as I was arguing with him that it was theft by love servant. Finally prison warders led me to this prison. I have no regrets. Suzika is dead and let me pay the cost of loving her dearly. ENDS
By
Patrick Achitabwino
The moment the steel gate banged behind my back I knew it was goodbye to the outside world. A sea of eyes congested in an overcrowded cell was tearing me apart. A pungent smell of urine in conspiracy with shit fleeing from the overflooded leadless pot dumped at a corner gave my nostrils the greeting of the cell.
For five years, five solid years, I have to live in this overcrowded cell, see death face to face, struggle with scabies and live on a weeviled-beans meal a day. But why only five years? I am shaking my hornless head. Why was the magistrate so unfair with me so as not to sentence me to life imprisonment? After all, I have nothing to lose; I have had enough of the sorrows of the outside world.
The image of Suzika still lurks at the back of my mind. She had the eyes that defied darkness, sparkling at night. Her round taxina-bottom swayed backwards many a necks of men along the streets. I recall with laughter one day along the streets when vendors nearly provoked her anger. As she was passing by they sung …mainjekishoni akulera…dibwiriyo, dibwiriyo…
We had been married for a year and she had not been blessed to visit the maternity ward any day sooner. What started as a mere stomachache one evening proved fatal and costly to our affair. Doctors diagnosed her with cancer of the womb. She had to be operated, they insisted.
The moment the prosecutor asked me to confess guilty or not guilty, the Chief Executive of Mayoka Town Assembly was astonished to see me pleading not guilty. I was not guilty, I could not be guilty and I will live never to acknowledge that I was guilty.
As I was standing in the dock, face to face with him as a principal witness of the state I drew him back to the morning I banged into his office, sweat dripping on my forehead. I asked him if I had not told him that my wife was wrestling with death at Mangani Private Clinic? That she would not survive if I would not get money to pay for her operation?
The Chief Executive, Che Jalasi as we all used to call him at the office, told the court that the conditions of service of the assembly do not provide for loans in excess of the K100 000 I had requested to people of my grade.
I reminded him that this was a case of life and death. I told him that conditions of service are mere words written by people. I had even challenged him in front of his desk at the assembly, my fist banging the desk, that by public demand a constitution gets amended then how special was a mere conditions of service.
The magistrate, grey haired with his eyes curtained by sunglasses lifted the gravel and hit his table several times to control my temper. They were accusing me of stealing K100 000 from my office. I did not steal, I insisted, on humanitarian grounds I took the money to save the life of my wife.
Infact the day Che Jalasi denied me a loan I rushed to the hospital only to find my wife on a life-supporting machine. She gazed at me once as if saying “why my darling, why not saving my life?”
I recalled that it was the month end and that people had paid rentals to the assembly and to make matters far much better I was the controller of the coffers of the assembly. Early morning I rushed to the office, opened the safe and took K100 000 then rush to the hospital.
“You will have an operation,” I assured my wife. I saw Suzika smiling as nurses were driving her on a stretcher to the theatre.
I kept waiting outside the theatre, fingering my rosary for divine intervention. I could visualize the medical personnel scissoring the belly of my wife, removing the cancerous part, suturing the wounds and driving her out to me. But all that was mere thinking.
A stampede of armed police personnel drove me out of the long train of thoughts. I was under arrest, they told me. I told them the arrest had to wait, the life of my wife was more valuable than the might of the handcuffs. They could not reason. They had much power in their long guns.
“Bayisoni Mayikolo, you will be charged for stealing public money,” a tall CID officer told me at the police station.
“Correction,” I told him. “You will charge me for saving the life of my wife. The only crime I have committed is to come to the rescue of my dying wife”
A band of police officers were astonished, I could read that on their faces. They ushered me into the remand cell that smelt blood. One of the remandees was shot in the leg in a shoot out with the police. He was an armed robber.
A bomb caught me while I was in that cell. A policewoman unbolted the steel gate and took me into another office. God forbid, filled with sympathy she let the cut out of the bag, Suzika was no more.
“Amen..amen…” I had nothing more to say.
In the courtroom the double-edged sword of justice, if indeed it is just, was at the blink of chopping my head.
“Before I pass judgement do you have anything to say?” the magistrate asked me.
I nodded my head and said no.
“You are therefore convicted of theft by public servant…”
I cut the magistrate short. “Objection my lord, convicted of theft by love servant…”
The magistrate hammered the gravel on his table. “Theft by public servant, and I am therefore sentencing you to…”
I could not hear the judgement as I was arguing with him that it was theft by love servant. Finally prison warders led me to this prison. I have no regrets. Suzika is dead and let me pay the cost of loving her dearly. ENDS
Only for love
ONLY FOR LOVE
By
Patrick Achitabwino
The day we met I was seated under a large acacia tree, my head leaning on my knees. Tears had stopped flowing out of my eyes, they were springing their way into my heart where only my blood could see them.
A crumpled piece of paper laid on the ground. The message was clear: the family of Nyamazaini is inviting friends and relatives to the wedding of their only son, Gracious to Ziolire Sokonombwe…As if that was not enough, Billy’s pumpkin head laid on the side of Ziolire’s on the photo.
I had called Gracious, unbelievably his voice sounded far much distant, barren from the love that it used to evaporate. We fell in love by coincidence, he had told me. He lost interest in me long enough than he could remember. My heart had grown deaf. I cannot recall anything he said. I only recall the phone clicking as it went dead.
I felt a tap on my shoulder as I reluctantly lifted my head up. A zoo attendant who later told me his name was Tiyanjana had squatted. He saw the marks drawn on my cheeks by a flood of tears.
His mother had told him never to cry, Tiyanjana told me. Crying would not solve my problems. It was not the end of my life.
I felt the broken pieces of love being mended in my heart. He embraced me and I felt the warmth of his chest. Whatever was it that was killing my heart, he reassured me, he was very sorry.
Tiyanjana told me he believed there is always time for everything. His mother died when he was young. His father married another woman who chased him away. He grew up along the streets until an orphans care center offered him solace.
He told me he acquired his school certificate and later on became a zoo attendant. I narrated to him the successes of my father as a businessman. I told him a betraying boyfriend wounded my heart. He sympathised with me and told me that the betrayer was not the one the Almighty had chosen for me.
I felt Tiyanjana felt the pains razoring my heart. He had suffered the same pains. The mother of the girl he had fallen in love with could not accept him for a son-in-law. He was told point blank that over her dead body, she could not accept a man who is not a graduate to marry her daughter. That was the point where love and money crossed paths as he told me.
I saw him again in the supermarket. He saw me. We saw each other. Our eyes twinkled at the joy of meeting again. We all waited and searched for words to say but the words refused to come.
I recall the Friday I went to the zoo happily again. Firstly, the hug was wonderful. There was a look in his eyes that seem to tell him that I would succumb to the weight of his love. One thing was clear, he was only waiting for the moment my knees of love would collapse. I was waiting too. My heart was waiting.
He told me he felt comfortable when I am around. He told me I make the world a good heaven for him.
The words tore my heart deeper than a razor blade. Aren’t razor blades better? For they cut where you can see but words cut where you cannot see. We hugged and I closed my eyes as the bar magnets of love pulled our lips closer. I felt being loved again. I felt what is it to be in the hands of a loving boyfriend.
I am the reason he would live in this life for, he assured me. If it was not for him, I would not have fallen in love again, I too confessed.
But fate lied a few centimetres away from us. My parents chased him when he came home to see me. I fled home for him. I was more comfortable in his bed-sitter house, a smokey-lamp made of a kerosene bottle sprouting a yellow light. For the first time I learnt what a nuisance rats can be. They kept chatting, chasing each other and even tasting our toes. It rained for a few minutes and some astray raindrops tore their way into the house. We held each other at the corner but still I had found the happiness I could not get in my fathers house.
At this time TVs did not matter, DVD was a vocabularly forgotten. I was more comfortable having supper on a mat and sitting on a chopped log turned into a small chair. I loved his trust. I loved his honesty.
My parents came two days later oozing anger. They whisked me into the Mercedes benz. I was crying. I saw Tiyanjana crying. I told my parents it was only for love that I was with Tiyanjana and that not even death could part me away from him
What did I know about death, about life, about love, to mention death and love in one mouth? My mother had fumed as dad was breathing angrily. They ordered a watch guard that I should not be allowed to walk out of the house, not even to be visited by anyone. I was ordered not to answer any phone call.
Four days later I escaped to the zoo only to be told that he has not been reporting for duties. I rushed to his home and his neighbour told me he had been admitted at Chitakale hospital the last night. I went there only to find him moaning all alone in bed.
Tiyanjana told me that since I left his home he resorted to bear drinking to kill the sorrows. He said he could not remember where he had been attacked at night. Worse still, the attackers had dismembered him and other passers by rescued him. He had been to the theatre but the damage was too severe that he would never be a man again. I cried. He told me never to cry. He said God would give me another good guy. I said no, not any other except him.
I saw papa and mama stampeding in like soldiers in a fierce combat. I beg you papa, I reasoned with him, take him to the private hospital. He looked at us, Tiyanjana was shivering with fear. Papa talked to a doctor at a corner for a few minutes.
I cannot love a man who is not a man to take my daughter for a wife, he shouted at me. With tears spiralling down my cheeks I told him that a man is one who cares for a woman. A man is not a man because of children. A man is a man because of the passion he has for his wife.
The watchman dragged me out of the ward into the vehicle. I am now a prisoner at home. Love is in a cage. I am still waiting for the day I will escape to be with Tiyanjana again. We will meet and escape to lands where love is left free and we would reminiscence over the past with laughter. Then I will no longer be Ezelyn Sabola. I will be Mrs Ezelyn Tiyanjana Tchete. Only for love I love him.
Just for love - short story
JUST FOR LOVE
By
By
Patrick Achitabwino
Thank you for taking a sit, mama. Beauty screamed at my door that Saturday morning. No sooner had I bolted the door open than she fell in. She was almost breathless.
“Robbers have shot dad in the ribs last night,” she told me amid sobs as a volcano of tears broke loose out of the chains of her eyes. As I held her on my bare chest, I felt her warm tears cascading down my ribs. She was frail. Her dad was still unconscious at Malingamoyo Private hospital.
There was literally no drop of water in my house. Saliva had gathered its army in my mouth and I could feel the sourness. The closest water kiosk had bursted. The only water hope was the borehole a number of football grounds away, just behind the house of the headman.
You know Mbayani mama. Twice you were lost the last time you visited me. You take this way only to find that it goes straight into the toilet of somebody. You return back and you are lost. The way is just after the toilet. Just dribble past its corner you note that the path continues.
The sad story is that her father did not survive the killing power of the bullet. When we went to the hospital we found nurses coating his body in white sheets. We all cried. Imagine, I was just in a pair of slippers, hair completely unkempt, mouth unbrushed. Beauty’s relatives who were at the hospital seem completely disgusted of my presence. But she clung to me like a little kangaroo in its mother’s pouch.
You see papa, her father was a prosperous businessman living in the wealthy people Mount Pleasant area. He owned a number of vehicles. Mr. Maluwa, a stocky-built man, with a forest of beard lost his wife through an accident many years past, just when Beauty was young. She was the only hope he had.
Anyway, only God knows where I was going when I met Beauty. It was a cool Sunday afternoon. A scrappy vehicle with its lights set on full hit her along the Kamuzu highway. The vehicle sped away. I saw her falling, rolling several times on the tarmac road. I was just too close and I rushed to see her. She had fainted. I stopped a vehicle, thank God the driver was kind to take us to Queen Elizabeth hospital. Her mobile phone kept calling but I did not know how to operate it.
Mama, you should have been there to see how delighted I was the soonest her eyelids parted open. I was afraid that if she dies, I could not have known where to go with her corpse, let alone who to call. She smiled, I smiled. I told her we were at the hospital. I looked at the fairness of her skin, it was more babysh.
“Thank you for saving me,” her accent was too English. She could not complete a mere sentence without infusing it with the Queens language. With the little JC I have I was able to grab a few words she used to spice her speeches with.
“What’s your name,” she asked me in English as well.
“My name is Matiki Mayilosi,” I stammered a little English.
Beauty called her father on her cell phone. In no moment I heard tyres screeching outside the hospital ward. His feet walked lazily against the floor like a slithering snake. The aroma of the smell of his perfume engulfed every part of my nostrils. I itched, honestly I did. She told him everything. He shook my hand, and it smelled perfume even after the hand shake.
“Thank you young man,” he said as he was fishing out a cheque book out of his breast pocket.
“Your name, please?”
I responded.
“Get this K20 000 cheque”
I confessed frankly that I had never stepped my feet in the bank. I do not have an ID to help me cash the cheque. He went into his car only to come back with three bundles of money. Each bundle comprised K10 000 of K500 notes. Mama, never in life before had I ever been blessed to grab such a huge amount of money in my hands. I trembled. I tried squeezing them in my socks but the money was just too much. I thought of buying a paper bag, put tomato in it so that pick pockets would not rob me.
Beauty and I became friends. Close friends. She bought me a cell phone. We fell in love mama.
You see what ma, gossipers rushed to her father. He called us together and said he had no problems as long as it was for real. I confessed it was, so too Beauty did. But she was completing her studies at one of the colleges in town. Mr. Maluwa said we should not go too fast until she completes her studies. He gave me a K100 000 to start business as I was jobless. That was how I ended up shifting from Mbayani to Soche East. My business is doing well.
I know you will be amazed to hear this. Robbers who shot dead my father-in-law were arrested. Beauty was a witness, we were all together. She told the packed court that on the night the attack happened, the five robbers broke the main door and demanded money from her father at gun point. He told them he had no money then they shot him. The most sad thing is that they gang raped her. Medical examinations confirmed the rape. Far much worse, three of the five bandits tested HIV positive.
“For shooting a victim dead and infecting a girl with HIV/AIDS I am sentencing you to death by hanging,” the magistrate ruled.
Pa, ma, I beg you to hear my story patiently. I am the only person Beauty can lean a shoulder on. Her father’s relatives confiscated everything from her home. They even sent her to the village. All her dreams were doomed.
She came home crying. Despite the AIDS threat I still love her. I know my love for her is the highway to death. Ma. Pa, should I not sacrifice for love? Please do not change your faces. Sindinadye mchira wa buluzi. It is only just for love that I love her. No woman in life has ever loved me the way Beauty does. People are dying of road accidents, malaria, floods, and does AIDS make any difference? After all we can live together for twenty years or more. Who knows, perhaps a cure might be found. May be the many stories of Chambe, Malawi Mix, whatever are prophecies of better days to come, the days AIDS shall be like any other curable disease.
Thank you for being attentive. I only pray that you be on my side. I love her, she loves me, we love each other. Not even the threat of death can separate us. END
Insured romance - a short story
INSURED ROMANCE
By
Patrick Achitabwino
Monday night. The hand of the clock pointed 8:49. Malikebu dragged his feet on the floor like the belly of a snake slithering its way into the bush. He forced his way into Zolozolo police station. It is an emergency, he told the police.
The last time he had seen Diandra, his wife for seven months was over the lunch hour at home. They talked of the war in Iraq, saw Charles Taylor in court in Siera leone courtesy of CNN news. She would drive to the hair saloon later in the afternoon, Diandra had told him as he was leaving for office.
“My wife has gone missing,” he told the police. “She cannot be contacted even on her mobile phone.”
Tuesday morning. As Malikebu drove to Bakodaya private mortuary deep in the city centre of Mangani city he stole a glance at the front page of the Daily Post newspaper. Woman murdered in a car ambush, read the headline. The Post had quoted the police PRO as saying that a woman identified as Diandra Malikebu was found shot dead in her vehicle in the outskirts of Minimini Township.
According to the publicist, the alleged car hijackers abandoned the vehicle after it had run out of fuel and they shot the victim dead.
He found the women’s choir at the mortuary. Reverend Makoka embraced him as he told him not to lose hope in God. The will of God is difficult to understand. It could not be as much more difficult as now. Diandra was the third wife in two years. Hurting so much was that all his wives had departed from the world through tragic circumstances.
Mellina was the first lady to insert a matrimonial ring on his finger. He was then an emerging businessman. Malikebu Stationery and Printers was just blossoming. Four months after the big day, fate skidded into his house. She was burnt in the house, reportedly due to an electrical fault while he was on a business trip to Mangochi.
Sopano awupeza moyo…kuli mtanda wayesu…sopano awupeza moyo, the choir sung as pallbearers were lifting the coffin carrying the remains of Diandra into a vehicle.
Malikebu had seen deaths. He had seen coffins. Alicia, his second wife of four months died in a vehicle that caught fire as she was igniting it on.
“Dust to dust, ashes to ashes,” reverend Makoka said as the coffin carrying the remains of Diandra were being lowered for eternal rest. Malikebu saw his love being robed off his sight by mere soil. Twin beads of tears broke from the chains at the edges of his eyes as they dribbled down on his cheeks.
“We have lost a hard worker, we have lost a firm believer in Christ,” the reverend consoled Malikebu as he was leading him to his vehicle.
The Malikebu family was well known as die-hard believers. Be it a big walk to raise funds for the church, the family would always be there. They majored in tithing. They could buy a choir a uniform, purchase cement to enhance developments at the church not forgetting sponsoring activities meant to fundraise for church projects.
Diandra was an active member of the women’s choir, women’s charity group, Children of God Orphanage Center and Women in Church Development. Malikebu was a church elder, chairman of the development committee, treasure of the church committee, and a patron of the youth wing of the church called Soldiers of Christ.
The night that followed the burial of Diandra became a nightmare in the life of Malikebu. He bursted his way out of the house, dressed in only underwear, screaming. A watch guard grabbed him as he fell down.
“Munthu akundithamangitsa,” he told the watchman.
The guard skidded into the house, searched all the rooms and found nobody. He grabbed the boss by the hand and led him into the sitting room.
“It must have been a bad dream,” the guard told him.
Malikebu stabbed his legs into a trouser and stuffed his hairy belly into a white t-shirt as the guard was walking out. It did not take him an hour in the house to scamper out again and dump himself into a car.
“Call the police,” he shouted at the guard as he was driving off.
Reverend Makoka was awed when Malikebu’s vehicle screeched at his door step.
“Pastor, pastor,” he was screaming as he was hurrying into the pastor’s house. “Pray pastor, pray…”
Reverend Makoka saw Malikebu lying on the ground, his face buried in the carpet. His wife joined him in prayer. Later on they showed Malikebu a room where he had to sleep.
Hardly half an hour elapsed than he rumbled out of the room, screaming. The pastor held him, prayed once more and gave him a bible to read in his room until sleep caught up with him.
The pastor and his family awoke in the morning but Malikebu shown no signs of being awake. They knocked on his door to wake him up for a morning prayer but he could not open. Reverend forced the door open only to see Malikebu hanging to the roof. He had hanged himself using a rope that was in the room on which people could hang their clothes.
The bible was still open on the pillow. On the last blank page of the bible was his final message and it read:
Pastor,
It is better to die in the house of the man of God. I am sorry for any shame my death would cause to the servants of God. I had no choice but to end my life this way.
Since the burial of Diandra, I have never had a moment of peace. In my house, the ghosts of Mellisa, Alicia and Diandra assaulted me accusing me of killing them. I escaped into your house but the ordeal continued. They said I would never find peace in my life.
Bear with me Pastor, the ghosts have all the reasons to accuse me. I used to insure every one of them for millions of kwachas that I ended up collecting from insurance agencies. Their deaths were all staged. Pray dear pastor that my soul may rest in peace.
Malikebu
By
Patrick Achitabwino
Monday night. The hand of the clock pointed 8:49. Malikebu dragged his feet on the floor like the belly of a snake slithering its way into the bush. He forced his way into Zolozolo police station. It is an emergency, he told the police.
The last time he had seen Diandra, his wife for seven months was over the lunch hour at home. They talked of the war in Iraq, saw Charles Taylor in court in Siera leone courtesy of CNN news. She would drive to the hair saloon later in the afternoon, Diandra had told him as he was leaving for office.
“My wife has gone missing,” he told the police. “She cannot be contacted even on her mobile phone.”
Tuesday morning. As Malikebu drove to Bakodaya private mortuary deep in the city centre of Mangani city he stole a glance at the front page of the Daily Post newspaper. Woman murdered in a car ambush, read the headline. The Post had quoted the police PRO as saying that a woman identified as Diandra Malikebu was found shot dead in her vehicle in the outskirts of Minimini Township.
According to the publicist, the alleged car hijackers abandoned the vehicle after it had run out of fuel and they shot the victim dead.
He found the women’s choir at the mortuary. Reverend Makoka embraced him as he told him not to lose hope in God. The will of God is difficult to understand. It could not be as much more difficult as now. Diandra was the third wife in two years. Hurting so much was that all his wives had departed from the world through tragic circumstances.
Mellina was the first lady to insert a matrimonial ring on his finger. He was then an emerging businessman. Malikebu Stationery and Printers was just blossoming. Four months after the big day, fate skidded into his house. She was burnt in the house, reportedly due to an electrical fault while he was on a business trip to Mangochi.
Sopano awupeza moyo…kuli mtanda wayesu…sopano awupeza moyo, the choir sung as pallbearers were lifting the coffin carrying the remains of Diandra into a vehicle.
Malikebu had seen deaths. He had seen coffins. Alicia, his second wife of four months died in a vehicle that caught fire as she was igniting it on.
“Dust to dust, ashes to ashes,” reverend Makoka said as the coffin carrying the remains of Diandra were being lowered for eternal rest. Malikebu saw his love being robed off his sight by mere soil. Twin beads of tears broke from the chains at the edges of his eyes as they dribbled down on his cheeks.
“We have lost a hard worker, we have lost a firm believer in Christ,” the reverend consoled Malikebu as he was leading him to his vehicle.
The Malikebu family was well known as die-hard believers. Be it a big walk to raise funds for the church, the family would always be there. They majored in tithing. They could buy a choir a uniform, purchase cement to enhance developments at the church not forgetting sponsoring activities meant to fundraise for church projects.
Diandra was an active member of the women’s choir, women’s charity group, Children of God Orphanage Center and Women in Church Development. Malikebu was a church elder, chairman of the development committee, treasure of the church committee, and a patron of the youth wing of the church called Soldiers of Christ.
The night that followed the burial of Diandra became a nightmare in the life of Malikebu. He bursted his way out of the house, dressed in only underwear, screaming. A watch guard grabbed him as he fell down.
“Munthu akundithamangitsa,” he told the watchman.
The guard skidded into the house, searched all the rooms and found nobody. He grabbed the boss by the hand and led him into the sitting room.
“It must have been a bad dream,” the guard told him.
Malikebu stabbed his legs into a trouser and stuffed his hairy belly into a white t-shirt as the guard was walking out. It did not take him an hour in the house to scamper out again and dump himself into a car.
“Call the police,” he shouted at the guard as he was driving off.
Reverend Makoka was awed when Malikebu’s vehicle screeched at his door step.
“Pastor, pastor,” he was screaming as he was hurrying into the pastor’s house. “Pray pastor, pray…”
Reverend Makoka saw Malikebu lying on the ground, his face buried in the carpet. His wife joined him in prayer. Later on they showed Malikebu a room where he had to sleep.
Hardly half an hour elapsed than he rumbled out of the room, screaming. The pastor held him, prayed once more and gave him a bible to read in his room until sleep caught up with him.
The pastor and his family awoke in the morning but Malikebu shown no signs of being awake. They knocked on his door to wake him up for a morning prayer but he could not open. Reverend forced the door open only to see Malikebu hanging to the roof. He had hanged himself using a rope that was in the room on which people could hang their clothes.
The bible was still open on the pillow. On the last blank page of the bible was his final message and it read:
Pastor,
It is better to die in the house of the man of God. I am sorry for any shame my death would cause to the servants of God. I had no choice but to end my life this way.
Since the burial of Diandra, I have never had a moment of peace. In my house, the ghosts of Mellisa, Alicia and Diandra assaulted me accusing me of killing them. I escaped into your house but the ordeal continued. They said I would never find peace in my life.
Bear with me Pastor, the ghosts have all the reasons to accuse me. I used to insure every one of them for millions of kwachas that I ended up collecting from insurance agencies. Their deaths were all staged. Pray dear pastor that my soul may rest in peace.
Malikebu
Libraries and National Development
LIBRARIES AND NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT
By
Patrick Achitabwino
Information and a conducive environment of its free flow is a vital tool in all forms of human endeavour. It is the link pin of national development. For a nation to develop it needs to have and provide relevant, updated and adequate information on food security, health, democracy, population, education, family planning, youth empowerment, gender equality, environment etc. Libraries are there for proper management, provision and dissemination of such information.
Paul Tiyambe Zeleza in the article The dynamics of book and library development in Anglophone Africa emphasised that books and libraries form crucial repositories of knowledge and information accumulated over time, so that to have access to them is to enter an ongoing intellectual conversation within and between societies and generations, and partake in the immense heritage of human social thought,
Information is power and power belongs to the people. Information is a vehicle that drives people to a better understanding that in turn induces sound judgement and decision-making.
It is irrefutable fact that libraries are a pivotal point in democracy promotion and socio-economic development in a country. Dickson Vuwa Phiri argues that for democratic processes to make sense, those that govern must be aware of the needs of those that are governed, whatever or wherever they are. To articulate such awareness, politicians and electorates must be provided with information relating to democracy, human rights and, the rule of law.
Nancy Kranich agrees when she said that libraries are the corner stone of democracy in our communities because they assist the public in locating a diversity of resources and in developing the information literacy skills necessary to become responsible, informed citizens who can participate in our democracy.
Even president Franklin Roosevelt during the Second World war when the future of democracy was much in question told the nation that libraries are essential to the functioning of a democratic society…Libraries are the greatest symbols of the freedom of the mind.
Information promotes and empowers citizens participation in the democratic process; it maintains the rule of law and creates a viable outlet for the injection of public opinion. Information informs the policy-making process of political leadership, all of which nurtures the building of sustainable peace for the enhancement of the state.
Libraries play a vital role in the health sector. A vibrant health sector needs a well-documented and organised health information meant for dissemination to users and potential users in order to consolidate health records, planning and management. Libraries provide people with appropriate information on diseases and prevention measures, health care, side effects of premarital affairs, dangers of early pregnancies and any other health related information.
According to S. Mapasure of Standards Association of Zimbabwe, in Zimbabwe were introduced Drug Information Centers and National Diabetes Information Clearing House that in the end minimised the misconceptions people had on drugs and diabetes. With the HIV/AIDS pandemic retarding socio-economic developments in our nation, measures to avoid the scourge and the enhancement of behaviour change can yield a positive impact if information on such issues was accessible to rural masses through rural libraries.
It goes without saying that rapid population increase impedes development. Libraries face the challenging task of being reliable reservoirs of information pertaining to problems associated with population increases. Land degradation, food shortages, deforestation, drying rivers, drought, urban migration, unemployment, rising prices, increasing poverty and diseases are all side effects of rapid population growth. As long as people are informed of such pertinent issues through their local libraries, the trend is likely to reverse. The world belongs to the living, so writes Thomas Jefferson.
Libraries play a great role in national development through the support they offer to the education sector. It is an irrefutable fact that without libraries there as well can be no universities hence the creation of professionals' drought. All professionals, whether graduates or not, are capable of utilising their skills through the knowledge they acquired through books and the internet in libraries. Lawyers safeguard the flow of justice and foster constitutional developments; teachers support literacy campaigns; doctors support health issues, the list is endless. All those are products of information dissemination progress through different libraries.
John Abdul Kargbo argues that experience has shown that a country’s educational system could be as strong and as weak as the library resources that support that system.
The National Library Service has been championing the provision of relevant information materials to different communities through the establishment of rural libraries with the element of supporting adult literacy as well as helping in the establishment of an informed society in Malawi. Through such small libraries, people who were deprived of information are now capable of reading and writing. High above all, having come across a wide range of information pertaining to issues affecting their societies, they have been able to make informed decisions that have been helping in implementing socio-economic growth.
Kigongo-Bukenya of the Makerere University in his presentation at the Standing Conference of the Eastern, Central and Southern Africa Librarians, SCECSAL XI, meeting argued that information for literacy arms the masses themselves completely to see their own needs and problems and discuss means of solving them. What is worthy noting is that for information to have a broad outreach, libraries must be there.
For a nation like Malawi that has an agricultural dependent economy, the need for management and provision of agricultural information to communities and individuals is necessary. Malawi require libraries that provide agricultural information which should be accessible to policy makers, researchers, extension workers, students and the communities as a positive step towards improving the declining food security in the country. Agriculture is the backbone of the Malawi nation and we need libraries that can be harnessing information on marketable crops, agri-business, agri-economics, diversion of crops, diseases affecting crops, farming methods, irrigation, etc.
The world is now geared towards industrialisation. However, industries can hardly develop without relevant information on prospects and challenges. There is therefore, writes Noel Shillinglaw and Wanda Thomas in the book The Information society, a need for professionally managed libraries at work places if total quality is to be achieved, because apart from making the information that enables decision making timely available, libraries also contribute significantly to staff development.
As competition in business stiffens and economic instability keeps threatening the nation, investors need information to develop suitable business strategies. In general terms they need libraries that can provide them information on economic data, import and export figures, changes in foreign exchange rate, inflation rate, as well as salary figures. The business community needs librarians that would be harnessing information on the cost of living, worker productivity, costs of machinery, changes in international treaties, domestic consumption and production, communication, infrastructure, labour laws, etc.
The role of libraries in promoting the marketing of the tourism sector cannot be underestimated. Libraries as reservoirs of information are the most reliable information reference centers where tourists can seek information on hotels, motels, national parks, mountains and other interesting places.
Unfortunately, at present, the greatest barrier to information provision by libraries to promote democracy and socio-economic issues is high illiteracy rate. Most information is in print and over half of the population of Malawians cannot read and write. Justin Kiyimba went on to say that coupled with illiteracy is the fact that even those who can read and write have little interest in reading.
Other barriers include lack of trained personnel in librarianship, lack of resources, financial constraints, inadequate library services, poor distribution network of libraries, lack of viable publishing industry that can be publishing and providing survey reports, workshop reports, etc on local democratic and socio-economic issues.
In a general perspective, as the UNESCO Draft Medium term plan 1984 n- 89, puts it, individuals and communities must be provided the knowledge and know how that will awaken them to the projects open to them, and above all, enable them to act more effectively themselves in improving productivity, hygiene, health and general living conditions and on exercising their civic rights. But the central point where information can be harnessed, accessed and disseminated is the library. If effectively used and supported, libraries can promote democracy and socio-economic developments in the country. No nation prospers without information and no information can be properly managed and disseminated without libraries and librarians. ENDS
By
Patrick Achitabwino
Information and a conducive environment of its free flow is a vital tool in all forms of human endeavour. It is the link pin of national development. For a nation to develop it needs to have and provide relevant, updated and adequate information on food security, health, democracy, population, education, family planning, youth empowerment, gender equality, environment etc. Libraries are there for proper management, provision and dissemination of such information.
Paul Tiyambe Zeleza in the article The dynamics of book and library development in Anglophone Africa emphasised that books and libraries form crucial repositories of knowledge and information accumulated over time, so that to have access to them is to enter an ongoing intellectual conversation within and between societies and generations, and partake in the immense heritage of human social thought,
Information is power and power belongs to the people. Information is a vehicle that drives people to a better understanding that in turn induces sound judgement and decision-making.
It is irrefutable fact that libraries are a pivotal point in democracy promotion and socio-economic development in a country. Dickson Vuwa Phiri argues that for democratic processes to make sense, those that govern must be aware of the needs of those that are governed, whatever or wherever they are. To articulate such awareness, politicians and electorates must be provided with information relating to democracy, human rights and, the rule of law.
Nancy Kranich agrees when she said that libraries are the corner stone of democracy in our communities because they assist the public in locating a diversity of resources and in developing the information literacy skills necessary to become responsible, informed citizens who can participate in our democracy.
Even president Franklin Roosevelt during the Second World war when the future of democracy was much in question told the nation that libraries are essential to the functioning of a democratic society…Libraries are the greatest symbols of the freedom of the mind.
Information promotes and empowers citizens participation in the democratic process; it maintains the rule of law and creates a viable outlet for the injection of public opinion. Information informs the policy-making process of political leadership, all of which nurtures the building of sustainable peace for the enhancement of the state.
Libraries play a vital role in the health sector. A vibrant health sector needs a well-documented and organised health information meant for dissemination to users and potential users in order to consolidate health records, planning and management. Libraries provide people with appropriate information on diseases and prevention measures, health care, side effects of premarital affairs, dangers of early pregnancies and any other health related information.
According to S. Mapasure of Standards Association of Zimbabwe, in Zimbabwe were introduced Drug Information Centers and National Diabetes Information Clearing House that in the end minimised the misconceptions people had on drugs and diabetes. With the HIV/AIDS pandemic retarding socio-economic developments in our nation, measures to avoid the scourge and the enhancement of behaviour change can yield a positive impact if information on such issues was accessible to rural masses through rural libraries.
It goes without saying that rapid population increase impedes development. Libraries face the challenging task of being reliable reservoirs of information pertaining to problems associated with population increases. Land degradation, food shortages, deforestation, drying rivers, drought, urban migration, unemployment, rising prices, increasing poverty and diseases are all side effects of rapid population growth. As long as people are informed of such pertinent issues through their local libraries, the trend is likely to reverse. The world belongs to the living, so writes Thomas Jefferson.
Libraries play a great role in national development through the support they offer to the education sector. It is an irrefutable fact that without libraries there as well can be no universities hence the creation of professionals' drought. All professionals, whether graduates or not, are capable of utilising their skills through the knowledge they acquired through books and the internet in libraries. Lawyers safeguard the flow of justice and foster constitutional developments; teachers support literacy campaigns; doctors support health issues, the list is endless. All those are products of information dissemination progress through different libraries.
John Abdul Kargbo argues that experience has shown that a country’s educational system could be as strong and as weak as the library resources that support that system.
The National Library Service has been championing the provision of relevant information materials to different communities through the establishment of rural libraries with the element of supporting adult literacy as well as helping in the establishment of an informed society in Malawi. Through such small libraries, people who were deprived of information are now capable of reading and writing. High above all, having come across a wide range of information pertaining to issues affecting their societies, they have been able to make informed decisions that have been helping in implementing socio-economic growth.
Kigongo-Bukenya of the Makerere University in his presentation at the Standing Conference of the Eastern, Central and Southern Africa Librarians, SCECSAL XI, meeting argued that information for literacy arms the masses themselves completely to see their own needs and problems and discuss means of solving them. What is worthy noting is that for information to have a broad outreach, libraries must be there.
For a nation like Malawi that has an agricultural dependent economy, the need for management and provision of agricultural information to communities and individuals is necessary. Malawi require libraries that provide agricultural information which should be accessible to policy makers, researchers, extension workers, students and the communities as a positive step towards improving the declining food security in the country. Agriculture is the backbone of the Malawi nation and we need libraries that can be harnessing information on marketable crops, agri-business, agri-economics, diversion of crops, diseases affecting crops, farming methods, irrigation, etc.
The world is now geared towards industrialisation. However, industries can hardly develop without relevant information on prospects and challenges. There is therefore, writes Noel Shillinglaw and Wanda Thomas in the book The Information society, a need for professionally managed libraries at work places if total quality is to be achieved, because apart from making the information that enables decision making timely available, libraries also contribute significantly to staff development.
As competition in business stiffens and economic instability keeps threatening the nation, investors need information to develop suitable business strategies. In general terms they need libraries that can provide them information on economic data, import and export figures, changes in foreign exchange rate, inflation rate, as well as salary figures. The business community needs librarians that would be harnessing information on the cost of living, worker productivity, costs of machinery, changes in international treaties, domestic consumption and production, communication, infrastructure, labour laws, etc.
The role of libraries in promoting the marketing of the tourism sector cannot be underestimated. Libraries as reservoirs of information are the most reliable information reference centers where tourists can seek information on hotels, motels, national parks, mountains and other interesting places.
Unfortunately, at present, the greatest barrier to information provision by libraries to promote democracy and socio-economic issues is high illiteracy rate. Most information is in print and over half of the population of Malawians cannot read and write. Justin Kiyimba went on to say that coupled with illiteracy is the fact that even those who can read and write have little interest in reading.
Other barriers include lack of trained personnel in librarianship, lack of resources, financial constraints, inadequate library services, poor distribution network of libraries, lack of viable publishing industry that can be publishing and providing survey reports, workshop reports, etc on local democratic and socio-economic issues.
In a general perspective, as the UNESCO Draft Medium term plan 1984 n- 89, puts it, individuals and communities must be provided the knowledge and know how that will awaken them to the projects open to them, and above all, enable them to act more effectively themselves in improving productivity, hygiene, health and general living conditions and on exercising their civic rights. But the central point where information can be harnessed, accessed and disseminated is the library. If effectively used and supported, libraries can promote democracy and socio-economic developments in the country. No nation prospers without information and no information can be properly managed and disseminated without libraries and librarians. ENDS
Koma Croc: A crocodiles' paradise
KOMA CROC: A CROCODILES’ PARADISE
By
Patrick Achitabwino
What comes to mind when people think of Mangochi is the azure Lake Malawi and Malawi’s pride, Chambo fish. The current strong advocacy for turning Mangochi into a tourism haven in a bid to turn tourism into Malawi’s gold has heavily been based on the presence of Lake Malawi and its wonderful shores highly spiced with numerous holiday resorts.
A trip to Koma Croc will let you realize that Mangochi has more to offer beyond the lake and delicious Chambo fish. Ever heard of anywhere in the country where the most feared animals, crocodiles, are bred for tourism? Koma Croc is the place. A single trip to the place will assure you that Malawi has more to offer in the tourism sector than meets the eye. Perhaps we only lack the vision, will and desire to diversify our minds.
The crocodiles’ haven is almost 25 kilometers away from Mangochi boma towards Monkey bay. A few kilometers before reaching a path to Lake Malawi National Park is a sign post written “Koma Croc” pointing a dusty road to the right that snakes through the edge of a hill. It is that road that leads to the amazing land of crocodiles.
The place looks more deserted with a few buildings. A single glance at the office of the Koma Croc is enough to tell you that you have dared to visit crocodiles in their territory. On the wall is nailed a skin of a slained crocodile.
Cast your eyes on a large tree close to the office; you will be assured that perhaps some crocodile hunters once challenged the mighty crocodiles. There is also nailed another skin of a crocodile, a rare sight indeed.
The adventure starts with a payment of K50 per head. You will not walk anyhow. The office has a guide, who for stage one will take you to a waist-high, roofless building. It has a small dam within. You stand by the waist-high wall as he courageously jumps into the building. Small crocodiles gather in groups, basking in the sun.
Drama begins when the tour guide gathers courage to challenge any of the small crocodiles. He is trained to catch them, perhaps the making of our own “Malawian crocodile hunter”. He provokes one small crocodile with a stick then it jumps towards it and as it falls to the ground he slightly pins it down to the ground with the stick around its neck. It wriggles its head and tail powerlessly. Next, he grabs it by the mouth and tail then takes it close to you. Finally he throws it back into the little dam.
“If that has to bite you, it can not cause great harm,” he assured me though I could not be that courageous to follow suit.
The next destination is some cages where middle sized crocodiles are kept. Perhaps they are then grown up into more lethal animals, he dares not touching any of them, let alone stepping into their cage.
Finally you are taken into a large building, over two meters high, roofless. In it large crocodiles are in different compartments. There is one pavement for visitors to walk through in admiration of the crocodiles. The pavement is separated from the crocodiles with wire fences.
You see large crocodiles basking in the sun, others swimming lazily in the dams within. It excites to learn some tricks crocodiles use to catch their prey. I saw a crocodile with its eyes closed, mouth agape. You might think it is dead.
“Its mouth stinks,” the guide told me and my colleagues. “That’s why you can see all those houseflies flying into its mouth.”
A crocodiles is clever, once many houseflies fill its mouth, it closes it and swallows them. The trick continues over and over.
But just as many tourism places are in the country, the crocodile farm needs a face lift. It must be highly cared for to attract the attention of tourists. With the Blantyre zoo existing in history books, if well cared for and publicized, the Koma Croc can be the best place where families might be going for a closer look at the fearsome animals. It can also be a good place for educational visits.
Author is Membership Services Officer for the Society of Accountants in Malawi (SOCAM) in Blantyre
By
Patrick Achitabwino
What comes to mind when people think of Mangochi is the azure Lake Malawi and Malawi’s pride, Chambo fish. The current strong advocacy for turning Mangochi into a tourism haven in a bid to turn tourism into Malawi’s gold has heavily been based on the presence of Lake Malawi and its wonderful shores highly spiced with numerous holiday resorts.
A trip to Koma Croc will let you realize that Mangochi has more to offer beyond the lake and delicious Chambo fish. Ever heard of anywhere in the country where the most feared animals, crocodiles, are bred for tourism? Koma Croc is the place. A single trip to the place will assure you that Malawi has more to offer in the tourism sector than meets the eye. Perhaps we only lack the vision, will and desire to diversify our minds.
The crocodiles’ haven is almost 25 kilometers away from Mangochi boma towards Monkey bay. A few kilometers before reaching a path to Lake Malawi National Park is a sign post written “Koma Croc” pointing a dusty road to the right that snakes through the edge of a hill. It is that road that leads to the amazing land of crocodiles.
The place looks more deserted with a few buildings. A single glance at the office of the Koma Croc is enough to tell you that you have dared to visit crocodiles in their territory. On the wall is nailed a skin of a slained crocodile.
Cast your eyes on a large tree close to the office; you will be assured that perhaps some crocodile hunters once challenged the mighty crocodiles. There is also nailed another skin of a crocodile, a rare sight indeed.
The adventure starts with a payment of K50 per head. You will not walk anyhow. The office has a guide, who for stage one will take you to a waist-high, roofless building. It has a small dam within. You stand by the waist-high wall as he courageously jumps into the building. Small crocodiles gather in groups, basking in the sun.
Drama begins when the tour guide gathers courage to challenge any of the small crocodiles. He is trained to catch them, perhaps the making of our own “Malawian crocodile hunter”. He provokes one small crocodile with a stick then it jumps towards it and as it falls to the ground he slightly pins it down to the ground with the stick around its neck. It wriggles its head and tail powerlessly. Next, he grabs it by the mouth and tail then takes it close to you. Finally he throws it back into the little dam.
“If that has to bite you, it can not cause great harm,” he assured me though I could not be that courageous to follow suit.
The next destination is some cages where middle sized crocodiles are kept. Perhaps they are then grown up into more lethal animals, he dares not touching any of them, let alone stepping into their cage.
Finally you are taken into a large building, over two meters high, roofless. In it large crocodiles are in different compartments. There is one pavement for visitors to walk through in admiration of the crocodiles. The pavement is separated from the crocodiles with wire fences.
You see large crocodiles basking in the sun, others swimming lazily in the dams within. It excites to learn some tricks crocodiles use to catch their prey. I saw a crocodile with its eyes closed, mouth agape. You might think it is dead.
“Its mouth stinks,” the guide told me and my colleagues. “That’s why you can see all those houseflies flying into its mouth.”
A crocodiles is clever, once many houseflies fill its mouth, it closes it and swallows them. The trick continues over and over.
But just as many tourism places are in the country, the crocodile farm needs a face lift. It must be highly cared for to attract the attention of tourists. With the Blantyre zoo existing in history books, if well cared for and publicized, the Koma Croc can be the best place where families might be going for a closer look at the fearsome animals. It can also be a good place for educational visits.
Author is Membership Services Officer for the Society of Accountants in Malawi (SOCAM) in Blantyre
Fraud: a thorn in the Malawi Economy
FRAUD: A THORN IN THE MALAWI ECONOMY
By
Patrick Achitabwino
By
Patrick Achitabwino
The unprecedented rate at which fraud is creeping its way into the Malawi economy is suicidal as the nation risks being nailed on the cross of poverty. A Kenyan conman was recently arrested in Lilongwe for operating a fake NGO that has swindled poor Malawians of their hard earned money.
It has now ceased surprising to hear that employees of company A or B have been arrested for fraudulent activities in excess of millions of kwachas. Newspapers are easily flooded with adverts about people who are on the run and that whosoever would give information leading to their arrest would be rewarded thousands of kwachas.
Fraud has become a rabbied dog that is viciously crippling the already weak economy of the country. The worst danger lies in the sense that most fraudsters are usually people in positions held in high esteem such that it is unthinkable that they might be involved in such malpractices.
Winnie Madikizela-Mandela - a potent symbol of resistance during the South Africa’s apartheid system – who was known as the ‘mother of the nation’ by her many supporters, but disparaged as the ‘mugger of the nation’ by her detractors, was convicted of fraud.
Madikizela-Mandela, a lawmaker, was found guilty of 43 charges of fraud and 25 of theft. Addy Moolman, her financial advisor, was found guilty of 58 counts of fraud and 25 of theft. The two were accused of fraudulently obtaining bank loans worthy 120 000 United States dollars in the name of bogus employees of the African National Congress (ANC) Women’s League, of which Madikizela-Mandela was president.
Fraud alongside corruption is threatening the survival of many corporate bodies in the country. Defrauded industries would in the end have no option but to close their businesses, as they would not be posting profits. That would in the end erode the investors’ confidence in the country, deprive the government of tax revenues hence inadvertently affecting developments.
The most unfortunate part of fraud is that it is capable of hiding beneath the veil of seemingly just operations. There have been allegations that some orphans care centres are just calculated means for self-enrichment in the name of supporting orphans.
Fraud has the power to curve highways to massive poverty. As the fraudsters get rich, millions of people end up wallowing in the whims of abject poverty. When industries are defrauded, massive job losses bare their teeth ending up spiralling millions more jobless people on the streets.
The Commission for Africa – a 17-member commission chaired by UK’s Prime Minister Tony Blair – noted that fraud is one of the evils that are hindering economic growth in Africa. Even with massive financial aid, Africa’s economic growth will be questionable, as fraud will be derailing it.
According to a report authored by a campaign group called Global Witness, fraud leads to chronic instability and poverty. For instance, in Angola, where quarter of the oil revenue is unaccounted for each year, one in four children dies in infancy. Yet, as Gavin Hayman of the Global Witness says, the international community spends 200 million US dollars each year trying to feed one million people in Angola who are critically dependent on international food aid.
Scars of fraud and their devastating impact in the health sector in the country are far much visible. Malawi registers one of the highest maternal deaths in the world as clinics run without drugs. Unbelievably, truckloads of medical equipments and drugs get siphoned into fraudsters’ houses. Such a fraud further puts the impoverished Malawian who survives on less than 1 US dollar a day on a great disadvantage. Just because he or she cannot afford health services from private clinics, he or she dies of diseases that could have easily been cured.
The insurance industry is suffering the consequences of massive fraud. There have always been reports of staged fake accidents all in the interests of claiming money from insurance companies.
And as technology advances, so too have fraudsters grabbed it as an opportunity to make more money. The Director of United States Secret Service Ralph Basham says that Internet fraudsters, motivated by money and armed with sophisticated technology, pose an increased economic threat as they steal data from companies and industries.
With just a few keystrokes, online fraudsters can disrupt the economy of a nation and our poor nation must stand on guard. The fact that Malawi is too poor such that its industries cannot invest millions on security software to protect their computer systems makes them an easy target for fraudsters.
Howard Schmidt, a special adviser for cyberspace security during the first term of president George Bush, cautioned that Internet fraudsters are increasingly targeting less protected businesses. Such a change in tactics poses a great risk to struggling economies of poor countries like Malawi.
Fraud devastates economies. For instance, law enforcement agencies in the USA disrupted an online organized crime ring that spanned 8 US states and six countries. The ring had stolen 7 million credit card numbers, costing consumers and credit card companies 4.3 million US dollars.
Malawians who surf the Internet are prone to online fraud. In accordance with the Internet Fraud Advisory, a not for profit group based in Britain, the internet has become a paradise of money laundering fraud, lottery winner fraud, primer on internet fraud and fake job fraud. Fraudsters have also embarked on creating and publishing dating or match making websites.
Fraud, if unchecked, will devastate our economy through the grounding of industries, crippling of health services, sky-rocketing the unemployment rate. It is the hope of the nation that the Money Laundering Bill will be passed in the national assembly soon.
Author is the Membership Services Officer for the Society of Accountants in Malawi (SOCAM)
