Ladies and gentlemen, once again, Atupele Muluzi has risen from irrelevance.
In a recent performance disguised as a press statement, our nation’s crown prince of recycled politics lamented the high cost of living, joblessness, and poor leadership. A bold stance from a man whose greatest political achievement remains being the son of Bakili Muluzi.
Atupele, with all the conviction of a boy who once tried to start a law degree and then decided meh, politics looks easier, is now lamenting the very decay his own father’s kleptocratic regime fertilized.
The irony is so rich, it could fund a fertilizer subsidy.
Let’s be clear: the Muluzi dynasty is not a political party. It is a family business, currently under liquidation.
And Atupele? He’s the soft-spoken intern forever being groomed but never quite ready. His political career is a masterclass in how to fall upwards: from Minister of Economic Planning to Minister of Health to Minister of well, whatever was vacant at the time. Each appointment more ceremonial than strategic.
UDF, once a party of national repute, now exists largely on WhatsApp groups and the dusty nostalgia of 90s politics. What was once a revolution is now a reunion. With Atupele at the helm, the UDF has become a yoyo party up when DPP pulls the string, down when reality hits. No ideology. No constituency. Just vibes.
And now, through the magic of Richard Chimwendo Banda’s delusions and Foster Ntandama’s “strategic alliances,” there is whisper of a backdoor deal to hand over 37 parliamentary seats to UDF. A political kamikaze mission so ill-conceived that even eastern region voters long loyal to the MCP legacy are threatening to boycott. Because when the gods want to punish a nation, they first make its strategists blind.
A weakened Eastern Region without a potential adversary in 2029 would be his sure ticket to the presidency. That Chakwera needs to first win the 2025 election is only an irrelevant footnote to his script of “How to grab power by any means necessary”.
He is dead wrong. Malawi Congress Party is not for sale. Ntandama, widely believed to be the “strategist” of this delusion will be best advised to go return the K87 million he allegedly received from Bakili Muluzi in exchange for MCP’s 37 potential parliamentary seats in the Eastern Region.
Let’s call it what it is: a betrayal.
A potential Chakwera-Atupele ticket would be the equivalent of lighting a match in a petrol station.
A man of God walking hand in hand with a man of many godfathers. It’s not a coalition; it’s a hostage situation. Chakwera would need to check under his car every morning, and under his bed every night.
The sheer political myopia of Chimwendo Banda drunk on ambition and allergic to caution is what’s driving this madness. To imagine Atupele as a heartbeat away from the presidency is to flirt with a national relapse. A return to the same tentacles of manipulation, ghost contracts, and proxy leadership that birthed Malawi’s current fragility.
Atupele has never led a movement. He’s never fought a real fight. His greatest skill is timing press conferences and smiling next to powerful people. He is not a politician he is a political accessory.
So when he tells us “Malawians are tired” he’s right. We are tired. Tired of recycled surnames. Tired of puppet sons dancing to the ghostly tunes of yesterday’s tyrants. Tired of the resurrection of irrelevance masquerading as leadership.
History has already written Atupele’s chapter. It reads: “Had potential. Then called his father.”
