OPINION | Chisale’s bravado may take DPP down the rabbit hole, yet again

“We learn from our past mistakes,” they say. But certain members of President Peter Mutharika’s current Cabinet seem unfazed to learn from their own past mistakes.

At the centre of this political theatrics is none other than Norman Chisale, who is the Deputy Minister of Homeland Security and the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPPP) youth director.

There is a popular saying in politics which holds that perception is reality and Chisale’s bully persona coupled with his last week’s public outbursts evoke memories of the DPP’s dark days.

In a viral video, Chisale is heard mocking former president Lazarus Chakwera who, along with some members of the Malawi Congress Party (MCP), was tear-gassed by police officers in Lilongwe during Kamuzu Day celebrations.

The DPP is still nursing wounds from the 2020 tsunami when the people handed them a humbling defeat.

That defeat wasn’t just accidental, it was a rejection of arrogance, impunity and the kind of strong-arm tactics that Chisale now romanticises.

Yet here we are again, watching the same script being rehearsed for what feels like a movie Malawians never asked for.

What is even more troubling is that the DPP has genuine achievements it has accrued in the current few months.

These include stable food supply and a suppressed inflation. But all these achievements risk being drowned out if Chisale or his ilk continue to intimidate or dismiss critics.

If the DPP wants to rise from the ashes like a phoenix, it must resist the gravitational pull of the toxic chest thumping of Chisale.

For President Peter Mutharika, he ought to publicly rein in figures like Chisale before they lead his government into another avoidable abyss.

At this point, silence isn’t a strategy but complicity and an antithesis to the very democratic values Mutharika religiously claims to hold in high esteem.

Meanwhile, the rabbit hole awaits but the only question is whether Mutharika and the DPP will step away from the edge or jump in.

The swagger of the likes of Chisale, among others, cost them an election in 2020. It is just less than seven months after the DPP second coming, and it is too early for the party to resume its shenanigans.

You see, a mistake repeated more than once is a choice. So, for now the DPP might be enjoying the goodwill of Malawians but to think that the status quo will last forever is a big miscalculation.

Targeting MCP and its erstwhile leader Chakwera by unleashing police force is akin to resurrecting a dead horse.

It is more like resuscitating MCP and Chakwera with some political oxygen which they desperately need for them to survive.

Mind you, politicians ride on the sympathy of the masses and as soon as people begin to empathise with politicians who they feel are being persecuted, it puts the government on the spotlight.

The DPP therefore, must desist from making Chakwera popular because by doing so is giving free publicity to him.

Look, it normalises political thuggery and signals to DPP loyalists that aggression is not only tolerated but also rewarded.

As such, this ferments violence at grassroot level, where political disputes can quickly turn bloody. Nobody wants that scenario.

Truth be told, not everyone endorses Chisale’s brand of politics. So, by allowing one individual to dominate headlines for wrong reasons, Mutharika risks alienating other level-headed members.

This may lead to internal fragmentations (which are already smouldering) that could weaken the party as Mutharika passes the mantle to the next czar of the party.

So, if the DPP is a party that truly respects decorum, it must call to order its somewhat untamed youth director who feels more powerful than everyone else in the party. Because if it fails to do so, it will be hard to discipline other powerless or nameless party members should they find themselves on the wrong side of the party’s rulebook.

What what should also be thinking that Malawi depends foreign things. These strongly abhor governments of impunity and brutality which Chisale is steadily creating for the eyes to see.

Meanwhile, the US and the United Kingdom embassies have not publicly commented on the former president’s teargassing, but diplomatic cables may have already been exchanged.

Finally, Chisale’s brinkmanship may push the DPP and MCP into a Thucydides Trap of some sort. Some of you may doubt that this can never apply to Malawian politics.

But look, MCP is the only challenger left to keep the DPP government on its toes. So, the latter will do anything to exert total dominance over the former.

As such, if it escalates, the terse political atmosphere will bleed into the 2030 general election and that will spell doom on our already young and fragile democracy.

In a nutshell, the Thucydides trap is a political term coined by an American political scientist Graham Allison.

It holds that when an existing superpower is on the cusp of losing its supremacy to a rival rising power, war is inevitable.

Historically, the term draws inspiration from a Greek historian Thucydides who forewarned about the conflict between the ancient cities of Sparta and Athens.

While the term is exclusively reserved for global superpowers, it plays out in Malawi’s political arena every five years.

In the years 2014 and 2019, election results were challenged in court respectively, and there were isolated incidents of election related violence that culminated into deaths in some parts of the country.

Deputy Homeland minister Chisale’s bravado is not just a personal flaw. Rather, it is a ticking bomb for the DPP.

President Mutharika, cannot afford to be silent on this. Now he stands at a familiar crossroads: to throw the party back into a legacy of impunity or rebrand it.

Otherwise, history will not be kind again. It will teach the same lesson, only this time with even less patience.

Now the rabbit hole is wide open. To fall in or not is a question of choice and time.

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This article first appeared in Daily Times