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President Bingu wa Mutharika Thursday asked the Scottish Parliament to carefully assess the smear campaign that Malawi opposition politicians were mounting against his leadership.
“These falsehoods regularly appear in the Scottish media and the opposition’s grand intention is to dissuade Scotland from supporting Malawi,” said Mutharika at Holyrood in Edinburgh when he addressed the Scottish Parliament. The president is on a four-day visit to the Scottish city.
The president’s remarks came at a time when his visit to Scotland was strongly criticised by the opposition Scottish National Party, who argued in the media that it was improper for the Scottish leader, First Minister Jack McConnell to invite Mutharika at a time when he was facing impeachment in the Malawi parliament.
Mutharika hoped that the Scottish Parliament would be able to see through Malawi’s political machinations and therefore support his government policies that were aimed at freeing Malawi from its poverty trap.
The president informed the Scottish parliamentarians that the root cause to Malawi’s current political crisis was a result of power struggle between himself and former president Bakili Muluzi.
“The political crisis in Malawi surfaced when my predecessor refused to step down from politics after retirement,” he said.
Mutharika said Malawi’s democracy was being threatened by the refusal of political leaders to accept change of power after the May 2004 elections, adding that part of the problem was because some politicians in Malawi considered themselves as indispensable.
Commenting on the current impeachment process in the Malawi parliament, which has been reported extensively in the Scottish media, the president said the move was being championed by corrupt politicians from the previous government who had turned against him because of his tough stance on corruption.
“Their plan is to discredit me and remove me from the office so that they should not be brought to book.I am now paying for trying to clean up corruption in my country,” said Mutharika.
He assured the Scottish parliamentarians that Malawi had made giant strides towards democracy, especially in terms of political structures despite the setbacks being experienced.
Mutharika also informed the parliamentarians of economic achievements that Malawi had started registering in the past year, citing the Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility arrangement that Malawi entered into with the International Monetary Fund as a clear indication of government’s determination to get the country onto the right economic path.
“The IMF programme is a very important achievement that should give Scotland the assurances that any assistance that your country shall provide to Malawi will be properly and prudently utilised and accounted for transparently,” he said.
Mutharika took the opportunity to brief the Scottish parliament of the current hunger situation in Malawi and how the government was correcting the situation to avert similar food crises in future through intensified small and large scale irrigation programmes.
The president’s address was witnessed by a group of Malawians who are presently in Scotland for an International Conference that would consider the impact of the Africa Commission Report and the G8 Summit resolution on Malawi.
Among the Malawian delegates to the conference, which has been organised by the Scotland Malawi Partnership, are Malawi’s former Vice President Justin Malewezi, People’s Progressive Movement President, Aleke Banda, representatives of civil rights groups and religioius leaders.
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