Too Late to say sorry: Chakwera’s Apology and the lessons for Hichilema- Dr Mwelwa

Too Late to say sorry: Chakwera’s Apology and the lessons for Hichilema

By Dr Mwelwa

Lazarus Chakwera has just performed one of the oldest political dramas on the continent—the late apology tour. He has remembered the tears of widows, the queues for fuel, the hunger of peasants, and the rage of bus drivers, but only when the ballot box is staring him in the face.

One wonders: is this the gospel of repentance, or simply the gospel according to “please re-elect me”? Where was this humility when Malawians shouted for help in the fuel queues, when mothers cooked without paraffin, when civil servants went home with empty pay slips? At the time, power was sweet, and the palace was warm. Now, when the seat is shaking, suddenly the President is fasting on national television with crocodile tears.

The lesson is too sharp for our neighbors in Zambia to ignore. Will President Hichilema one day also stand before cameras, one week before elections, confessing that he too ignored the cries of farmers with unsold maize, the graduates roaming streets with tattered CVs, the miners inhaling dust for nothing, the marketeers chased by council officers?

Will ZESCO suddenly stop exporting power a month before elections, declare “load-shedding is fixed,” and hope Zambians forget the candles and cold stoves of the last four years? Will fertiliser trucks roll in just in time for campaign songs, after seasons of drought in the granaries of our farmers?

Chakwera’s apology raises a haunting question: is truth only useful when the ballot looms? Can the confessions of a leader heal the wounds he allowed to fester? It is one thing to say sorry, another to undo the years of deception.

It is easy to blame cartels, but who appointed the cartels into government offices? It is easy to point at sabotage, but who was in charge when the sabotage began? Leaders love ghosts and scapegoats when elections arrive.

And so, the satire writes itself: today it is Malawi’s President begging forgiveness with folded hands, tomorrow it may be Zambia’s.

The theatre of politics is always full—repentance only comes when the throne is at risk. But Zambians and Malawians alike are learning: a nation cannot be governed by apologies printed a week before the ballot. As the Bible says, “Do not be deceived; God is not mocked. A man reaps what he sows” (Galatians 6:7). Leaders who sow lies will not harvest votes, no matter how sweet their eleventh-hour apologies sound