By Apengie Apengire
The images and reports from the recent Kamuzu Day commemorations in Lilongwe should disturb anyone who claims to care about Malawi’s democratic trajectory. A gathering organized by the Malawi Congress Party to mark the legacy of its founding leader was broken up by police using tear gas. In a democracy, that fact alone is a problem.
When the context is added — an opposition party holding a private event after being excluded from the state function honoring its own historical leader — the incident moves from regrettable to indefensible.
Let’s be clear about what happened and why it matters. MCP members assembled to commemorate Kamuzu Banda. The police intervened, citing lack of authorization, and dispersed the crowd with tear gas.
The Malawi Congress Party contends it organized its own event after being sidelined from the government-led function, despite the fact that the person being remembered was the party’s founder.
If that account is accurate, then the state used force to shut down a peaceful political assembly that posed no immediate threat to public order.
This is not a technical disagreement about permits and procedure. It is about whether the ruling Democratic Progressive Party is willing to tolerate political activity that it does not control.
The use of tear gas against a gathering of citizens engaged in commemoration is a disproportionate response in any circumstance where there is no evidence of violence or imminent danger. Tear gas is not a crowd management tool for convenience. It is a force option meant for situations where public safety is at stake.
Deploying it against people who are singing, laying wreaths, and giving speeches sends a message that dissent and independent political expression are unwelcome.
The pattern makes the moment more concerning. According to MCP officials, party leader Lazarus Chakwera was excluded from the official state function commemorating Kamuzu Banda. When the party then held its own event, that too was disrupted. This follows earlier instances where Chakwera was reportedly barred from attending the inauguration ceremony of President Peter Mutharika after the 2025 election.
Taken together, these actions suggest a deliberate effort to narrow the political space available to the main opposition and to deny it the ability to engage in public commemoration of its own history.
That approach corrodes democracy. Political competition requires more than periodic elections. It requires that opposition parties be allowed to organize, to assemble, and to speak without fear of state interference, provided they act within the law.
When the state treats the commemoration of a political leader’s legacy as a security threat, it signals that loyalty to the ruling party is a precondition for public participation. That is not how a plural society functions. It is how a one-party reflex survives inside a multiparty system.
The justification offered — that the gathering lacked clearance — does not hold up under scrutiny if the process for obtaining clearance is itself applied selectively.
If government events honoring the same figure proceed without incident while opposition events are met with force, then “procedure” becomes a pretext for suppression. Rule of law cannot mean one set of rules for the ruling party and another for everyone else. It means equal application, predictable process, and restraint in the use of state power.
Condemnation is warranted because the stakes are not abstract. History in Malawi and across the region shows what happens when the line between policing and political intimidation blurs. Once the state normalizes force against peaceful opposition gatherings, it becomes easier to justify the next escalation.
What begins as tear gas can become detention, harassment, and worse. The job of a democratic government is to de-escalate tension, not manufacture it.
It also damages Malawi’s international standing. The country has long been regarded as one of the more stable democracies in the region. That reputation rests on the ability of different political actors to compete, to commemorate, and to contest ideas without the state choosing sides with force.
When footage of police dispersing an opposition commemoration circulates, it undermines that reputation and invites scrutiny from partners who expect adherence to democratic norms as part of any partnership.
The appropriate response now is straightforward. The government should ensure an independent review of the police action on that day, including the decision-making chain that led to the use of tear gas. If there was no credible threat of violence, those responsible for ordering or executing the dispersal must be held accountable.
The Inspector General of Police and the Ministry of Homeland Security should clarify what criteria were used and why less intrusive measures were not applied. Transparency is the only way to restore confidence that the police serve the public, not a party.
Beyond accountability, there needs to be a public recommitment to the right of assembly. The Constitution guarantees freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
Those rights do not disappear when the gathering is organized by the opposition or when it honors a figure associated with the opposition. If there are genuine public order concerns, the state has a duty to facilitate the event safely, not to shut it down.
Malawians deserve better than a politics where every public act by the opposition is treated as a provocation. Commemorating Kamuzu Banda is not a crime. It is part of the country’s political history, and multiple parties have a stake in how that history is remembered and debated.
The DPP may disagree with MCP’s interpretation of that legacy, but disagreement is resolved through speech, argument, and at the ballot box — not through dispersal tactics that put citizens at risk.
If the ruling party believes it has the superior record on governance and the economy, as its supporters often claim, then it should be confident enough to compete in the open.
Using the police to manage political narrative is an admission of insecurity, not strength. It tells Malawians that the government fears ideas more than it fears disorder.
The events of that day should be remembered as a warning. Democracy is not maintained by default. It is maintained by consistent adherence to rules that apply to everyone, and by the refusal to use state power to settle political scores.
The tear gas fired at Kamuzu Day did not just disperse a crowd. It dispersed the idea that all Malawians have equal standing to participate in public life. That is the real damage, and it must be addressed before it becomes the new normal.
