Catholic Bishops in Malawi have warned the citizens to look for Visionary Leaders at all levels in the coming general election if they really want to transform their country.
The pastoral letter, which issued on Sunday 1st, 2013 and signed by all the Catholic Bishops, observed that there was limited adherence to the rule of law and limited compliance to the practice of the separation of powers and lapses in the promotion and safeguarding of people’s rights.
The Bishops also noted continued occurrences of witch-hunting and arbitrary arrests of government critics without thorough investigation or recourse to natural justice and efforts to side-line and remove political competitions from the electoral race.
The church leaders further denounced the abuse of power by parties in government with much interest in centralized power than in creating an enabling environment for citizen’s participation in governance and development processes that affect the future and destiny of the nation.
They also noted that there is a limited responsiveness, accountability and weak public goods delivery by government systems and structures. “To this extent, it is not surprising that we are hearing of voices labeling our democratization project as a change without transformation and a democracy without democrats,” reads the pastoral letter.
The Bishops also criticized the politicization of development initiatives and business opportunities as they noted that Malawi continues to lag behind most African countries in terms of development. They asked the nation to make some amendment in the manner things were done and wished that the original vision of independence is recovered.
The statement further said that with the next year’s general election, celebration of Golden Jubilee for independence and Tripartite Elections scheduled for May, the country should take it as Golden opportunity to re-examine the national conscience, recover nation’s original vision, redefine their destiny and forging ahead is of paramount importance in strengthening the destiny of the country. The Bishops said that issues of quality leadership, citizen participation, national development agenda and national values are of major concern to them and therefore they are given a proper attention.