This nation confronts numerous challenges, leaving many people bereft of hope regarding their standard of living. Some have dubbed it “Bagamoyo”, alluding to a notorious slave trading centre from the previous century, where captives from this country were transported and sold to eager purchasers.
Unlike its neighbours, Malawi has not been endowed with precious minerals, or its minerals were not discovered until now. The British administrators did not expect much from this country and, therefore, decided not to designate it as a settler colony. Instead they made it a protectorate, where Her Majesty’s Government would send administrators to look after the interests of the few British people that were either planters or missionaries. When Nyasaland, as the country was called under the British, was locked in a Federation with the two Rhodesias, the expectation was that it would be a source of labour which would be needed in the other territories.
During his 1960 visit to Portugal, Dr. Hasting Kamuzu Banda faced a tough question from a reporter, who asked what Band had up his sleeve to revive Nyasaland’s economy, which was broken even before independence.
“Don’t ask me that! Leave that to me!” declared Banda with a sharp retort.
Yes, the running of a country’s economy is left to the country’s leaders. When the economy is afloat, the President and his/her team take the credit. When it nosedives, they take the blame. But that is only half the truth.
I will reiterate what I said a few months ago, namely that the followership of a country is just as important as, nay more important than, the leadership. The leadership alone cannot achieve much. Leaders must set and pursue the right policies, must develop the infrastructure and must instill law and order for an economy to run smoothly. Bribery, nepotism and impunity will obviously interfere with the delivery of these, and other, public goods and must not be tolerated.
Citizens are constantly on guard to make sure that they are not getting a raw deal from their leaders. If there is a job in Malawi that is prone to harsh public criticism, justified and unjustified, it is that of the President or cabinet minister. Henry Fayol (1841 – 1925), a French mining engineer who contributed a great deal to modern Management thought, gave us fourteen management principles. One of the fourteen is simply expressed as “authority and responsibility” meaning that the people that are given authority should also be responsible for what happens under their authority.
As I was putting together this article, there were rumours to the effect that the country would run out of fuel and queues would once again return to our filling stations. Already fingers were being pointed at those in authority, and naturally so, as if to illustrate Fayol’s principle.
Like I have stated before, the leadership problem is easier to deal with than the followership problem. In our democracy, we have the chance to choose new leaders every five years but we have no opportunity, none whatsoever, to change the followership. And yet followers, the private citizens as I like to call them, have great capacity to make the economy tick.
One of the countries touted as an economic marvel of the modern era is Malaysia. The people of that country, under their able leaders, have not ceased to surprise the world with their long strides in their economic performance. The Malaysian GDP grew from $1.92 billion in 1960 to $407 billion in 2022. Save a few shocks along the progression path, the economy has been on a steady upward trend over that period. The period spans many leaders, so it is not any particular leader that must take the credit. Generally, all the leaders have contributed a great deal to the progress. And so have the followers!
If Malawi and Malaysia swapped leaders, Malawi could rise from its current economic under-performance but it would not be easy for the new leaders here. Economic transformation would come after a long period, at any rate not less than 15 years, by this columnist’s reckoning.
If, however, the followership was swapped, meaning if everybody living in Malawi went to Malaysia and everybody living in Malaysia came to Malawi, without changing the leadership, I would postulate that the economic transformation would occur a lot more rapidly. In no time, the Malaysians would transform our agriculture and our tourism way beyond recognition. They would not let crops fail as a result of sporadic rains, for example. They would instead turn to our numerous water bodies and stun the world with prodigious agricultural output. Other sectors would transform in a similar manner.