One for the Chilembwe Day

Chilembwe Day. I am not sure whether to wish you a Happy Chilembwe Day because I am not sure if it is supposed to be a happy day. All I know is that it is day that has to be commemorated and I am surely having fears that over time this day will lose its relevance and we might as well end up scrapping it off our calendar. That I wouldn’t like.

Taking this holiday into consideration, this day has just been an added Saturday to the week; as in, I am having an otherwise normal week with two Saturdays. This is because I have not seen anything that sounds like some national commemoration of a national hero of some sort. I know this might be due to my absence from the front of a TV screen or lack of interest in listening to the radio. Perhaps it is the place I am based at which sometimes locks me into a world of my own; in a place where I do not have a connection to the outside world.

While I just knew that today was a public holiday, I got the reminder of the real thing from a Whatsapp group. One good member posted an audio clip of one man who narrated that he remembers Chilembwe as someone who started a premature struggle against white people who would have developed the country if they were not chased in 1915. He went on to say we should compare ourselves with those countries that gained independence in the 90’s and see the development gap between the us and our counterparts. Pretty much that.

The audio clip generated some debate on the forum. Most of the people who commented on the issue were in agreement with what Frank (I think that is what he claimed his first name was; I don’t like using surnames) said and a good number were silent. If my memory serves me well, I was the only person who opposed that for what I think was a good reason.

In the first place, I personally do not think that the Chilembwe uprising (that’s what we learnt in Social Studies, Standard 6) did much in ousting white settlers in the country. They remained here till the 60’s. Make no mistake, I am not saying that it did not have any effect on our independence. Chilembwe’s stuggle, in a way empowered the people; helping them realize that they could fight for their own rights and independence, which manifested a couple of decades later by the beginning of the fight for independence from the colonial rule by some locals.
In short, white settlers stayed even after the uprising, so saying that the Chilembwe uprising pushed out people who would have developed this nation sort of sounds baseless to me.

I could talk more on this point, but it is not that important. On the other hand, the other fault I had with this gentleman’s reasoning was the “tikudikira mzungu” ideology of thinking about retrospective “ifs” of development. Yes. Some countries might have been developed by their colonial masters but that ignores the fact that development has continued in those countries even under native rule. Here at home we have the Malawi Congress Party which likes to boast (note; it’s not boost) about what they did in their 31 years in power, and I must say there are a couple of developments and innovations. Not sure whether they are right to add that to their political CV but the main point is that there have been some innovative projects that were done post-colonial period and what we have failed is keeping on keeping on in the path of development.

That was one big digression. I was talking about how over time we are having a disregard of this Chilembwe so called day commemoration and I think I might have the reason for that. Actually I think that that is the reason someone might wake up and decide to take off the reverend’s face from the 500 bucks note (we call it galu or mjavi, do we not?) The reason is simple and it is that we do not have good documentation of Chilembwe’s history. I recently read an account of the death of the reverend online. The author of the article claimed that he got them from some court records in which some officers were testifying in a bid to collect the bounty that was put on Chilembwe. This was a white fella, by the way. Not, in any way, a Malawian. Tinadikira mzungu, and we don’t have much of our own records or a 1500 paged book about a person we consider a national hero. If that Chilembwe play is still aired on the local radio, MBC 1, it will soon no longer be aired and when the holiday goes that far, we might as well decide to take it off the calendar because at the end of the day it will just be setting us one day behind when it comes to productivity. For no reason.

On the other hand, I think we all have something to learn from the good reverend and that is patriotism and putting the lives of people before personal interests. I choose to ignore the statements going around that the Chilembwe struggle was more personal than it was for the people’s good. I think that this is one major element that is lacking among the modern day Malawian. Then there is the courage. I don’t have to explain that.

If you, like me, did not do anything at all to commemorate this day, then at least look at the positive side of Chilembwe and look think of what you can give to those who are underprivileged or oppressed within your vicinity; think of how you can positively impact their lives. Probably the most important point in the whole article. Another man of God, the Major 1, has already started doing it. Why not you?