We’ll smoke each other out, Khumbo tells Bingu

The newly-registered People's Party (PP) has said the recent infamous "I'll smoke you out" outbursts by President Bingu wa Mutharika have no place in the democratic Malawi.

Khumbo Kachali, PP vice president said in the eastern region where the party was officially launched at Mangochi old airport ground on Sunday.

He said Malawians fought gallantly against the ruthless one-party totalitarianism of the late Dr. Kamuzu Banda and therefore would not accept to recede to the "dark days" as evidenced by the president's militant approach to national issues.

President Mutharika has recently threatened civil society leaders and state vice president Joyce Banda that he would arrest them and if they went into hiding elsewhere he would smoke them out.

Kachali: Challenges Mutharika

He has accused them of being mastermind of the July 20 and 21, 2011 mass protests against the deteriorating social, economic and political order under his leadership.

But speaking to thousands of PP enthusiasts at the Mangochi event, where the VP who is PP's founder and leader was also in attendance as guest of honour, Kachali noted that the president had adopted his militant disposition because he was not in the country when Malawians suffered under the one-party dictatorship.

He said if the president insists on pursuing his militant disposition, then "we'll smoke each other out" saying Malawians voted him into power not to threaten them in various ways but to serve them with a view to changing their livelihoods for the better.

Speaking earlier, PP provincial chairman, Samson Msosa claimed Mutharika is not a Malawian.

The veteran politician alleged, saying former president of Mozambique Joaquim Chissano confirmed this when he last visited the country to attend independence celebrations.

He recalled that the former Mozambican leader had said he had accepted an invitation to come to Malawi for two reasons—one that Mutharika was the incumbent chair of African Union then; and two, because an elder brother of the president was a king in Mozambique.

He said owing to this revelation, he was of the strongest view that Mutharika was not a Malawian but a Mozambican, wondering "how can one be a king in a foreign land" as you only become chief or king in your land of your birth and that of your ancestors.

Meanwhile, the state vice president conveyed a message of "correction" to Mutharika from the families of the victims of the July 20 and 21, 2011 riots. At least 19 people were shot dead by the police during those protests.

"I have a message to convey to the Head of State. The victims' families say he should immediately stop describing the fallen loved ones as 'thugs' and 'thieves' as they not die while pursuing any clandestine activities," she said.

She cited the case of 19-years old Lovemore Nevara who was killed in cold blood in Lilongwe s having met his fate while he went to buy eggs for relish at home.

Banda said, Lovemore's sobbing father had told her when she went to their home in Area 23 recently that the president, let alone any government official, had ever visited them to condole them and it "pained a lot" when their late son and others who died on that day are continually referred to as "thugs and thieves" by the same president and his agents.

The PP leader said if Mutharika and his government insist on branding the July 20 and 21 victims "thugs", she would advocate for the invitation of foreign experts to investigate the circumstances that led to loss of life on that day; who instructed the police to shoot at unarmed citizens; and establish the reasons that led to such instructions and actions.

Nyasa Times 13 Sep, 2011

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Source: http://www.nyasatimes.com/national/we%e2%80%99ll-smoke-each-other-out-khumbo-tells-bingu/
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