Give Us a break, Government

Recent media reports that government would like to introduce many bills among them the Marriage, Divorce and Family Relations Bill and the HIV and AIDS Bill need to be welcomed with caution tinged with critical thoughts.
The highlight of the former bill, we gather, is to criminalize polygamy in this country whilst that of the later proposes that there should be mandatory HIV tests for expectant women and their spouses, sex workers, recruits for the army, police and immigration, and polygamous unions among others. According to this bill, those who fail to take these mandatory tests will face the wrath of the law—which is a five-year jail term or a fine.
While the government intention is to reduce the spread of HIV in the country, which is an innocent ambition, a sober look at these bills will greatly help and government has to tread carefully.
For one thing, if government introduces these mandatory HIV tests, it will be like trampling on people’s rights and furthermore, it will be like a contradiction to some of the government laws such as labour laws. For example, forcing army officers, the police and immigration workers, for crying out loud, will be discrimination at work place. And what benefit will the test on these officers bring if one may ask?
Furthermore, the HIV and AIDS Bill will bring a lot of confusion in this country. As per proposed in this bill, people will be required to disclose their statuses before they engage in sex and if someone has infected another person deliberately with the virus, he/she will be incarcerated. Well, well, well, how will a person exactly pinpoint that this or that person infected me with the virus? And how will the courts prove this beyond reasonable doubt? This will just make the country’s judiciary to be flooded with too many cases that will delay judicial dispensation in this country. And does this bill intend to make people who have the virus not to enjoy their conjugal rights? Isn’t this stigma and discrimination of people living the virus?
And on banning polygamy? I think the government has now gone too far. What the government should know is that Malawi is a multi cultural multi-lingual and a multi-religious country. Therefore, formulating laws that are in favour of one group of people makes others feel out of place. Already, those religions that support polygamy like the Muslim community and those cultures that tolerate it like the Ngoni people, see that this bill is targeting them.
Furthermore, this bill will be in total contradiction with the freedom of association and worship that are enshrined in the country’s constitution.
The last time I also checked the country’s statistics, they registered that women make up 52 per cent of Malawi’s total population against 48 per cent of men. This means that women are in large numbers than men. And where will other women go if government criminalizes polygamy? Ask these women, every woman would like to be loved by a man. Will this not make the other women start prostitution? Or does the government want women to be marrying their fellow women? Won’t this promote homosexuality that government, our culture and religious bodies loathe? And, if truth be told, women enter into polygamy on their will and no one forces them to do so.
So what am I saying? Formulating policies and changing laws for the fun of it will just put this country into division and disturbance. Already, the government has introduced the quota system as procedure of selecting students into the country’s public universities, under the guise of equitable sharing of resources, which some quarters of the society like the northerners have expressed misgivings.
Then we hear government would like to change the innocent national flag. As this is not pleasing enough, last year we saw the passing of the Police Bill which gives powers to the police service to conduct a search without warrant and the Local Government Bill which saw the president acquiring powers to decide the date for the local government polls which up to now we don’t know whether they will be conducted or not. We also gather that the government intends to come up with the Sex Workers Bill that will allow commercial sex workers do their business in their homes. We are also hearing, from the media, that the government would also like to formulate a policy to regulate child bearing in Malawian families. We wonder now, what is next?
Much as some of these measures are intended to bring sanity in this country, I think they are being fast-tracked and being implemented without wider consultations with people. Let the government consult with all stakeholders and engage people in a debate first before formulating some of these bills.