Fare thee well, Aleke

When I was 21, while reading accountancy at the University of Malawi's The Polytechnic downtown Blantyre, I was alarmed to read in the newspapers that Malawi had ratified a campaign that banned smoking in public areas. Though I have never smoked in my life, I was enraged. The reason was tobacco was then as it is now Malawi's largest forex earner. I felt that somebody sitting high on the pedestal of influence was handing over to our country a rope to hang ourselves with. So concerned was I that I wrote to the Minister of Agriculture, protesting the decision. I reasoned that the best we should have done as a country was to remain non-commital. America and Israel had chosen this option on many decisions that might affect their countries. Israel, for instance, had refused to ratify such sort of campaigns that involved stopping to use cluster bombs, though the whole world had agreed to do so. Aleke Banda was minister then. Amazingly, he responded to me not once but three times, responding to each of my responses, thereby engaging me in a debate. Later, I was to write to other ministries to raise concerns on various issues that affected my country. No minister responded even once.

Now Aleke Banda is dead. I remember this brief interaction we had. I never met him in person even when, later, a few positions I held in society might have given me an opportunity to. I, however, like millions of other Malawians, always held Aleke in the highest regard.

Aleke was a minister that worked hard. Each ministry he went to began to perform wonders. He took Malawi's ministry of Finance in 1994, at the turn of the new political dispensation, when the national coffers were literally empty, looted, as it were, by the ousted Malawi Congress Party. Aleke spent a month visiting the USA, Germany, Great Britain, France and the European Union, among others, persuading them to unlock aid to Malawi. Back home, he worked tirelessly with a team of prominent economists, trying to reshape our country's economic policy.

Legend has it that one such economist has a story to tell. A few days after Aleke had been appointed Minister of Finance, he assembled the government economists and asked them to formulate sound economic policies that our country should adopt to improve the economy. The doctors and professors went home without taking the minister's plea seriously. What did Aleke, a man who went no further than high school, know about economics? They joked about it as they drank at Bwandilo and also in Capital Hotel's Kachere Bar, which is within earshot of the Capital Hill, the seat of Government.

The day came when each economist was to report to the minister what their proposals were. One economist went straight to parrot the Haris-Todaro model, without identifying it by name. Aleke cut him short. "Look," Aleke said, "I expected you to do a little more than that. The Haris-Todaro Model has severe limitations that cannot work for the country. One limitation of this model is that it assumes potential migrants are risk neutral, as in they are indifferent between a certain expected rural income and an uncertain expected urban income of the same magnitude. This assumption's reflection of economic realities is questionable; poor migrants will likely be risk averse and require a significantly greater expected urban income to migrate . . ."

The rest of the economists were baffled. Presentations were discontinued. Aleke chastised them to take his request seriously. If they returned to present outdated theories, he'd be inclined to release all of them and hire expatriates.

That was Aleke.

Later, he was to to be transfered to the Ministry of Agriculture and the Ministry of Health. Wherever he went, there were results. He was said to work late into the night. His teams always felt pushed to the limit.

Popular opinion has always been that if Malawi had five cabinet ministers of Aleke's calibre, the country might change for the better. Some of us feel sorry for the nation when cabinet ministers speak freely to the national media about employing each other's sons or brothers for personal assistants. Such ministers are known for little else. To them, an appointment into the cabinet is an opportunity to employ themselves and their families. Aleke had no time for that. He always wished the best for this country.

Now, Time has written its ruthless signature on his fate. He is gone. Malawi may have a lot of politicians on the field, but, certainly, it shall never have another Aleke Kadonaphani Banda. There are many who might not agree with this, but millions of us common folks out there are now nodding their heads sadly, wishing Time could reverse its hands and let Aleke live only a little more.