Malawi has once again slipped into darkness — not just the kind that comes when the lights go out, but the deeper, colder darkness of bad governance. This darkness is both literal and figurative. Literally, because there is no electricity — homes are dark, industries are silent, and families sit by candlelight wondering what went wrong. Figuratively, because everything else is collapsing too — fuel prices are soaring, fertiliser costs are skyrocketing, and the cost of living is rising like floodwater. It feels like déjà vu.
When the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) was in charge, electricity flowed like the Shire River — steady, dependable, and alive. Homes were lit, industries were breathing, and hope glowed across the land. Malawians could plan their evenings without fear of blackouts. But now, with the return of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), it’s as if someone has switched off the nation’s power — both literally and metaphorically.
The lights are out again. And with them, the dreams of millions are flickering into shadows.
We’ve been here before. Under DPP, Malawi became a country where candles sold faster than bread, and diesel generators hummed louder than the voice of reason. Electricity was rationed, and corruption was not. They turned blackouts into business — using the crisis they created to cash in through fuel contracts and shady deals. It was a time when the night was longer, not because the sun had gone down, but because the truth had been dimmed.
So yes, Malawians remember. They remember how they kicked DPP out for these very reasons. They remember the thievery that crept into every ministry like a snake in tall grass. They remember how those in power gorged themselves while citizens queued for fuel and prayed for power. And now, barely back in the saddle, the same dark clouds are gathering again — crisis after crisis, this time once more in the name of “electricity.”
It is said in Africa that “a man who does not learn from his past mistakes will soon sit on the same anthill again.” And here we are, sitting on that anthill, feeling the sting of our own political forgetfulness.
When MCP left government, they left with electricity — with light, with hope. Today, Malawians are waking up to the grim reality that those lights went out with them. The difference is night and day — literally. The same DPP that left us in darkness before is again manufacturing another crisis, as if suffering were a tool of governance.
And it’s not just power. The fertiliser crisis is another storm cloud over our heads. When MCP was in charge, fertiliser sold between MK90,000 and MK120,000. Today, it’s MK250,000 — a price tag that mocks the smallholder farmer and spits in the face of national food security. How can a farmer in the central region — the food basket of the nation — afford that? Without them, Malawi’s granaries will be empty, and hunger will prowl like a stray dog through every village.
We are, once again, a begging nation in the making.
As the proverb goes, “when the drumbeat changes, the dance must also change.” But DPP seems to be dancing to the same old corrupt rhythm, drumming out hardship for ordinary Malawians.
It is time for those in power to remember: leadership is not about enriching cronies or creating crises to profit from them. It is about lighting up lives — not snuffing them out. Malawians deserve better than this recycled misery.
The darkness that has fallen across the nation is not just from power cuts — it’s from the absence of integrity, foresight, and compassion. And until the light of accountability shines again, Malawi will remain a nation stumbling through the night, haunted by the ghosts of its political past.
Because as another African saying warns: “The child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth.” Malawians are cold, angry, and tired — and they are watching.
