Beyond Failure: Exploring the Heart of the Malawian State

Following a national referendum in 1993, Malawi transitioned from the 30-year autocratic regime of Hastings Kamuzu Banda and the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) to become a democratic state.Footnote1 While sustained pressure from a wide variety of actors contributed to this transition, of particular importance was the 1992 Lenten pastoral letter from the Catholic bishops of the Episcopal Conference of Malawi, entitled ‘Living our Faith’, which famously expressed open criticism of the MCP regime in a number of areas, ranging from limitations on press freedom to access to education and health care.Footnote2 The Malawian Catholic bishops’ Lenten letter of 25 February 2024 also sought to make political waves. Although unlikely to cause as great a political shift as the 1992 letter, the bishops similarly attempted to intervene in Malawian politics by publicly calling the state’s leaders to account. In the letter, entitled ‘The Sad Story of Malawi’, they vehemently declared that the Tonse Alliance governmentFootnote3 has so far failed to deliver, with its leaders having ‘resorted to being salesmen of words, with no serious attempt at keeping any promises they made to the people’.Footnote4 The letter subsequently outlined ten areas of failure, including corruption, concerns about press freedom and politically motivated violence.