Malawians praying new leader will bring rebirth

The faithful came to Easter Sunday mass in Malawi’s capital Lilongwe with Bibles in one hand and newspapers in the other, to read about their new president Joyce Banda and pray for the rebirth of a dying economy.

A policeman’s daughter and women’s rights activist, Ms Banda was swiftly sworn in as the small southern African country’s president on Saturday to succeed Bingu wa Mutharika, who died on Thursday and was widely blamed for the economic collapse.

In the former British colony, one of the world’s poorest states where about 80 per cent of the population is Christian, the Church had been a focal point in opposition to Mr Mutharika, a former World Bank economist who had ignored calls at home and abroad to change flawed economic policies.

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His antagonistic relations with major western donors such as Britain and the United States, which bankrolled about 40 per cent of the country’s budget, led to the freezing of millions of dollars of aid, punching an enormous hole in the nation’s finances.

“We pray that the donors will absolve us of our sins,” one churchgoer named Julius said at the Maula Parish Church.

Mr Mutharika’s disastrous reign had led to crippling foreign exchange and fuel shortages. Churches were packed in Lilongwe yesterday, partly because few could afford a ride back to their villages in the few mini-buses that had petrol.

With Mr Mutharika gone, Malawians are hoping they can rebuild bridges to the outside world and restore aid funding that helped pay for fertiliser subsidies and seed programmes that had once turned a country of subsistence farmers into food exporters.

“Banda taking office is a big sign that we are on a new and better path. We have been praying that God will help her and will help our country,” said Sister Margaret Madziataika, one of the Sunday celebrants.

Easter, and Ms Banda’s inauguration as the first female head of state in southern Africa, marked the culmination of several days of turmoil and uncertainty

A two-day delay in the official announcement of Mr Mutharika’s death after a heart attack on Thursday had stoked fears that the late president’s brother, foreign minister Peter Mutharika, whom he had been grooming as a possible successor, might be foisted on the country in defiance of the constitution.

There was widespread relief when Ms Banda, who was expelled from Mr Mutharika’s ruling DPP party in 2010 after an argument about the succession, was sworn in with the backing of the judiciary, army and police chiefs.

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Hopes are high that Ms Banda, a successful businesswoman who developed grassroots anti-poverty programmes, can repair the damage inflicted by Mr Mutharika’s mercurial rule in a country touted by tourist brochures as “the Warm Heart of Africa”.

One of Malawi’s major independent newspapers, the Nation, said optimism over the new Banda government should also be tempered by the history of once promising leaders later tarnished by arrogance and corruption.

“After the false dawns of the last regimes, Malawians will be forgiven for reserving their judgment until much later,” it said in a cautious editorial.