By The Opinion Desk
Leadership matters—not just in rhetoric, but in background, exposure, and professional discipline. A president shaped by global academia, international institutions, and professional competition understands systems, accountability, and the value of merit. Such a leader naturally surrounds himself with competent, financially stable individuals who add value to the State rather than drain it.
This is why leadership grounded in global exposure benefits a nation.
Contrast this with the tragic experiment Malawians endured under President Lazarus Chakwera.
A former reverend whose survival depended on church offerings ascended to the highest office in the land, and State House gradually began to resemble a glorified vestry. Instead of attracting technocrats, diplomats, and professionals, power gravitated toward loyalists—many financially desperate, politically obedient, and administratively unqualified. The consequences were disastrous.
Nowhere was this more evident than in Malawi’s foreign missions.
Embassies—meant to be strategic centres of diplomacy, trade promotion, and national representation—were reduced to boarding houses for sons, daughters, spouses, and cronies of the politically connected. Merit was discarded. Competence was sidelined. Diplomatic norms were trampled. Public trust evaporated.
These postings were not about advancing Malawi’s interests abroad. They were about securing livelihoods for insiders at the taxpayers’ expense. In a country battling crippling debt, fuel shortages, medicine stock-outs, and collapsing public services, the MCP government chose to expand embassy staffing recklessly—bloated, unjustifiable, and immoral.
It was not incompetence alone. It was entitlement.
Against this backdrop, the decision by current President Arthur Peter Mutharika (APM) and the DPP administration to slash embassy staffing by half stands out as rare fiscal courage in Malawi’s politics. Saving a staggering K47 billion by cutting unnecessary diplomatic positions was not just prudent—it was patriotic. That money was redirected to serve Malawians, not privileged families feeding off the State.
Diplomacy is not charity. An embassy is not a reward centre for political loyalty. It is a serious institution that demands expertise, discipline, and professionalism.
The MCP government’s overstaffing of embassies was therefore more than poor judgment—it was a betrayal of national interest. It signalled a leadership that viewed public institutions as extensions of personal households, and state resources as private entitlements.
Malawi deserves better.
The country needs leadership that respects public money, values competence over loyalty, and understands that governance is not ministry work—it is serious business. Anything less reduces the State to a feeding trough and condemns the nation to perpetual decline.
