Pastoral Letter of the Episcopal Conference of Malawi

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ and all people of good will, we greet you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Considering that the forthcoming Tripartite Election will be conducted at the threshold of both the fiftieth anniversary (Golden Jubilee) of our country’s independence and the twentieth anniversary of the reintroduction of multiparty democracy in 1993, we, Catholic Bishops, cordially invite our fellow Catholics and all people of good will, to make the best of the said elections as they provide us with a golden opportunity to rediscover our national destiny. Like Joshua and his compatriots, we see Malawi to be at a crossroad: “If you will not serve the Lord, choose today whom you wish to serve . . . .As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord” (Joshua 24:15). We are urged to rediscover our national destiny and commit ourselves to it following the footprints of our founding fathers and not opt for self-destruction. We are called to rediscover and build the Malawi our forefathers envisioned and not continue creating a Malawi that betrays what our forefathers fought and died for.

To underline the gravity of the forthcoming elections we present before you a brief assessment of our achievements and failures since independence. While we have made some progress in achieving our destiny it is evident from the brief assessment that follows that we are very far from achieving the Malawi our forefathers wanted. The forthcoming Tripartite Elections provide us with the best opportunity for strengthening the vision of our destiny. Essentially this entails conducting elections that are free, fair and credible and electing leaders that have the desire, commitment and capability of turning our country around. It also entails that the electorate can get out of the chronic abject poverty by electing leaders who can enable them to do so. Not holding such kind of elections, not voting and not electing this kind of leaders is in our case similar to opting to choose death instead of life.

This is the message of our letter which we present to our fellow Catholics and all people of good will. This is our appeal to all stakeholders in the forthcoming elections.

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