Escom Woes Need Cooperation

The recent article that was carried in one of the local dailies that the Electricity Supply Corporation of Malawi (Escom), has changed its slogan from “Power all day, every day” to “Towards power all day, everyday,” makes for a good reading.
Needless to say, the abandoned slogan did not reflect the reality on the ground. And in fact, it was mockery and utter torture to the minds of many Malawians.
How could Escom boasts of giving out “power all day, every day” when it is common knowledge that there are blackouts everyday, sometimes all day?
It was little wonder that the Consumers Association of Malawi (Cama) took Escom to court for failing to live up to its slogan. Simply put, it was an embarrassing catchphrase for Escom and an inflammatory buzzword for the consumers.
However, that Escom is failing in its mandate to efficiently generate, transmit and distribute electricity, is now well understood.
It is now an established fact that Escom, the country’s second biggest parastatal after ADMARC, is not performing efficiently largely because is swimming in a pool of problems.
As the 2009 Report on the Performance Analysis of Escom clinches it all, Escom now “is one of the loss making parastatals,” and one cannot agree more.
For one thing, Escom has huge debts to settle, a consequence of mismanagement, greed and irresponsibility on the part of Escom workers.
For example, at the time when the Malawi’s sole electricity company is swimming in financial woes, the whole nation got shocked when one of the local papers revealed that Escom had spent a whopping K80 million in organizing a Christmas banquet for its senior workers last year.
Of course there is nothing wrong in organizing a once in a while party for workers who have toiled the whole year, but spending such a huge amount of money especially when the company has got cash flow problems, is both disgusting and scary. In fact, it begs the question; is Escom really cash-strapped?
Of even hard to fathom are media statements coming from Escom’s boss Peterson Zembani that Escom will also hold the same kind of feast this year. What a pity!
Not long ago, Escom proposed a 54 per cent tariff hike to the Malawi Energy Regulatory Authority (Mera) arguing that it was and still is cash-strapped and cash-starved. Is Escom not missing something here?
Surely, one would be tempted to think that Escom is taking Malawians for granted. Another problem, and perhaps the main one, bedeviling Escom, is that of corruption.
Nowadays, it takes a whole year after paying the electricity connection fee for Escom to connect a house with power. Reason? Many Escom workers want applicants to bribe them first before they connect electricity. Often times, they give a pretext that the equipment for planting electricity is out of stock. But one wonders how the equipment is readily available after giving them a dosage of corruption. Very unfortunate!
However, the blame for electricity woes should not squarely be put on Escom. Calling a spade by its name, the government also has a fair share of the blame. How?
Several government’s departments and ministries owe Escom huge debts amounting to billions of Kwachas. It appears these branches of government take Escom for granted since it is also a government company. They thus use electricity willy-nilly without settling the money which is billed to them. So how is Escom going to improve its operations if it is meeting these hurdles? Surely, this should change.
Another problem that has also affected Escom badly is the vandalism and theft of Escom property such as oil from transformers. The implications of these sick conducts on Escom do not need to be overemphasized here.
It is, therefore, important to realize that there is more to Escom’s woes than meets the eye. It is for this reason that there should be cooperation from all quarters, if Escom’s problems are to be brought to a grinding halt. Changing the slogan alone should not be the final step “towards power all day, every day”. I think the change of the slogan should be taken as a point of departure as the name puts itself. Cooperation essentially means the act of working together towards the ending of the perennial power cuts that are affecting the economic development of this country.
However, the government needs to take a leading role. All debts that it owes to Escom must be settled forthwith. At the same time, it should also instill sanity in Escom workers by authorizing all expenditures and prosecuting all alleged cases of corruption and abuse of office.
It is therefore surprising and unfortunate that despite parliament passing the Public Finance Management act in 2003, which spells penalties for the misuse of public money or property for controlling officers, no one has been prosecuted on matters pertaining to the same. To this end, we need the cooperation of the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) and the police to help in instilling fiscal as well as management discipline in Escom.
It should also be down to Escom to make sure that all the monies that the government owes to Escom should be recovered and settled. Escom should also put in place ways of collecting money from government without problems. For example, in this digital era, Escom should have introduced the pre-paid system by yesterday.
Furthermore, all hoodlums who vandalize Escom property should be reported, brought to book and be given stiffer penalties. This, I think, requires the cooperation from the police, judiciary and ordinary Malawians.
Finally, it should be borne in mind that energy is a very important sector for economic growth and development. It is of great importance therefore that we band our heads and work together as a country to promote this sector and create a reliable and a sustainable energy supplier.

Reflecting on Circumcision and HIV/AIDS

Culturally, it is considered a taboo to discuss matters pertaining to sex in public domain. That is understandable. As a Malawian proudly conscious of my culture, this, and for a good reason, is the idea I totally subscribe to.
Surely, norms and values are indispensable to any society. However, when I beg to differ is when the society allows these norms to override all other concerns more especially at the expense of critical issues. For example, it is unfortunate that up to now, there are still communities in Malawi where HIV/AIDS issues are still a taboo.
This problem, it seems, is historical. It was so when first cases of HIV and AIDS were being reported in Malawi in the mid 80s. Malawians never wanted to discuss the causal relationship between sex and HIV/AIDS. Reason? Culturally, it is a taboo to share notes on sex issues. Still it was so when condoms were firstly being advocated as one of the preventive measures of HIV/AIDS. And, for the same reason, it is so with the issue of male circumcision and HIV/AIDS.
For many years now, there has been a growing body of medical and pragmatic evidence that has suggested the link between male circumcision and HIV/AIDS. The convincing evidence testifies that male circumcision reduces the risk of contracting and transmitting HIV—the virus notoriously known to be the cause of AIDS.
A research published in the Journal of Plos Medicine in 2005, suggested that male circumcision reduces HIV infection risk in heterosexual men by 50-60 percent. It further estimated that male circumcision could avert six million HIV infections and three million deaths in sub-Saharan Africa over a period of twenty years.
“There is a tremendous potential for male circumcision to have an effect on the HIV epidemic particularly in sub-Saharan Africa,” Catherine Hanking, Chief Scientific adviser to the United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and co-author on the study said in the report.
However, it seems evidence of male circumcision as a protective measure against HIV/AIDS dates back to the late 1980s. As I gather, researchers working in Africa and Asia noticed that HIV-prevalence rates “differed dramatically among neighbouring regions and were often lowest in areas where male circumcision was practiced.”
Recently, randomized control trials in South Africa, Kenya and Uganda have confirmed and supported the link between the two. The studies say male circumcision has a promising safety and significant efficacy.
Even pleasing to note is that circumcision has health benefits beyond HIV prevention. Researchers have discovered that male circumcision provides increased protection against the herpes, syphilis and chancroid. It also appears that male circumcision has been recommended for hygienic and sexual reasons. Surely, it seems, there is more to this issue than meets the eye.
However, what is disheartening to note is that the Malawi government has chosen to bury its head in the sand and pay a deaf ear and a blind eye to this overwhelming evidence suggesting the inextricable link between male circumcision and HIV/AIDS.
At the time when the HIV scourge is ravaging the lives of many Malawians, it is very unfortunate that the government is dragging its feet in coming out with a stance on this hotly contested subject.
Sadly, according to a slew of health reports, around 14 per cent of Malawi’s 13 million people are HIV positive with 300 cases being registered every day. What this essentially means is that about 1 million Malawians are living with the virus. So why then is Malawi not adopting male circumcision as one of the preventive measures of HIV/AIDS? One cannot find an answer to this question.
Of course, it is understandable that rolling this into action might require scaling up medical facilities and medical training for effective implementation thereby straining the country’s limited resources, but let’s be more reasonable, we are talking about saving human lives here.
To put the record straight, I am not saying the nation should rush headlong in adopting male circumcision to complement the existing interventions on HIV/AIDS, but surely, the solution does not lie in remaining silent. For, being quiet would only delude those men who are currently circumcised into thinking that they are 100 per cent protected from infection thereby shoving their precious lives to fate. It would be utter foolhardy to think that circumcision is an alternative to using condoms.
Already, other sub-Saharan countries are streets ahead of us in exploring other avenues of combating HIV/AIDS. South Africa, we gather, is developing a policy on male circumcision for HIV prevention while in Kenya, 20,000 men have been circumcised in the past year in a programme called Voluntary Medical Male Circumcision (VMMC). Botswana is also not lagging behind as it is tirelessly training teams to provide the service in all its public hospitals for free.
In Malawi, it’s now that we have heard that there was an HIV and AIDS Research and Best Practices Dissemination Conference held in Lilongwe between 2-3 July this year at Crossroads Hotel, where among other issues that were discussed was about the link between male circumcision and HIV/AIDS.
However, it remains to be seen whether Malawi, like other sub-Saharan countries, will adopt a policy out of the notes obtained at this much-needed conference. Of course, as we told, some private reproductive health institutions including some public hospitals, do conduct male circumcision for medical reasons but a government policy is needed to ensure that the operations are safe, low-cost, legal and option available. The proof of the pudding, says old wisdom, is in the eating.


The author is a Media for Development student at Chancellor College.

Cracks of African Leadership

I recently listened to a BBC Africa Have Your Say Programme where the topic of discussion was “why do African leaders always want to cling to power?”
This, I guess, was in the wake of unpleasant news that Niger President Mamadou Tandja, had tampered with that country’s constitution to allow him stay longer in office.
Indeed, one of the most serious cracks of leadership in Africa is the greed of African leaders to remain in power forever. But why is this so? One would really be tempted to ask this question.
Usually, African leaders insist on remaining in power because they fear from being held accountable for the political crimes they committed and for the social and economic mess these leaders create when they are in power.
Another problem with African leaders, and perhaps the main one, is that they cannot just bear the thought of parting ways with the life of luxury that goes with the status of the president.
They thus create loopholes and perform all unimaginable maneuverings so that they should not release the lid of power. Often times, they try to find cunning ways of elongating their stay in office.
So, the story of one Mamadou Tandja is not one that can surprise any keen follower of African history. If one can dig deep into the annals of African history, one can find out that Africa has had a litany of power hungry leaders. .
Several presidents—including Blaise Compaore of Burkina Faso, Idriss Deby of Chad, Sam Nujoma of Namibia, Paul Biya of Cameroon and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda—all secured constitutional amendments allowing them to stand for a third term in office.
But others, for instance, former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo and Frederick Chiluba, including our own Bakili Muluzi failed in their third term bids, despite arguing that it was the people who insisted they stay in power to continue the 'good work'. Little wonder, after attaining independence— and to the chagrin of many colonialists— a majority of African leaders turned dictators.
Of even more ridiculous to note is the fact that many of the leaders who clung to the echelons of power were champions of liberation.
Take, for example, the Zimbabwean leader Robert Gabriel Mugabe. He is a classic example of a freedom fighter turned dictator. He has been in office since Zimbabwe attained its independence from Britain in 1980.
Of course, we cannot gainsay the fact that some of these leaders came to power through the barrel of the gun. Libyan leader colonel Muammar Gadaffi and the erstwhile president of Nigeria General Sani Abacha epitomize such kind of leaders.
And Gadaffi too, for good reasons or not, has been in office for quite some time now. Recently, I gather, he was celebrating his forty-years in office and his retirement, it seems, is nowhere in sight.
The list of power hungry leaders can go on and on so long it is in Africa. In Gabon, there was Omar Bongo, the hitherto Africa’s longest serving president. In Uganda, the name Yoweri Museveni cannot be separated with that country and before him, there was also Idi Amin who used to take delight in calling himself “His Excellency, the President for Life.”
Such are African leaders who do not care about the needs of their people, economies and development but only have a one-track mind of self-aggrandizement.
Of course, there are a few exceptions of African leaders who demonstrated that they had the welfare of their people at heart when they gave up power peacefully. One such leader in recent history is Nelson Mandela.
President Mandela of South Africa was a statesman who set a good example for African leaders. He ruled South Africa only for five years despite the constitution giving him the mandate to stay on in office for another term.
Of pleasing to note is also the fact that he turned down several persistent calls from many South Africans who wanted him to continue rulling. This spirit lacks in the minds of many African leaders.
Power hungry African leaders, more often than not, give a flimsy excuse that they are acting on pressure from the public. Many, as President Tandja of Niger, say that they want to continue the economic projects they started. Typical!
True, they do sometimes initiate development projects, but can there not be anyone who can continue those projects through their helping hand? One would also ask this question.
Sadly, and it is a fact, Malawi, has had its fair cracks of leadership. I mean the cancer of bad leadership so to speak.
Kamuzu, to say without fear or favour, was made dictator. He ruled for about three decades and if it were not for some well-meaning Malawians, he could have stayed longer than this. It was the same story with Muluzi when he ascended into office.
He too, true to the fashion of most African leaders, tried every trick available in the book to stick to power. He thus brought the third and open term bills that were both thwarted in parliament.
But, perhaps, Muluzi outflanked his African counterparts because he unabashedly wanted to bounce back into power while he was out of office until the Electoral Commission foiled his plans. Shame!
All these scenarios, I think, point to the fact that African leaders do not like the sound of quitting leadership. Tandja is not the first nor will he be the last to scrap off constitutional limits for presidency.
However, the wisdom that these leaders don’t have is that one good quality of leadership is knowing when to leave. In fact, quitting, as one Malawian journalist said, is leading too. The best leaders of African history never demanded extra time, they bowed out when the ovation was loudest. Our current leaders should tap lessons from people like Mandela.


The author is a Media for Development student at Chancellor College.This article appeared in the Daily Times of 02 October 2009.