Thread by @General_wongie

*SAM MPASU 1945 to 2018*
Sam Mpasu was a Malawian politician, author, and former diplomat. He served as Minister of Commerce, Secretary General of the United Democratic Front (UDF) in 1999, and speaker of the Malawi National Assembly.
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Mpasu was a student at Dedza secondary school and went to University of Malawi's Chancellor College.Mpasu served as a diplomat in the foreign service for the Malawi mission to Germany.While in Germany he wrote a book in 1975 entitled Nobody's Friend.

which got him arrested because the Kamuzu Banda regime thought that it was written about Kamuzu Banda.Mpasu was detained without trial for "two years, one month, one week, and one day" in Mikuyu Prison from 1975 to 1977. At his best, he never minced words where he thought...

some truth that needed to be divulged was being trumped beneath some unscrupulous desires of some individuals, mostly politicians. He was often deemed a very defiant student who had the guts to openly criticise the political system of his time.

When he came out of prison in 1977, he was stamped by government authorities not to work anywhere in Malawi, not even to operate any legitimate business.Many job offers that he had on his desk were blocked. It was when he was offered a job by Lever Brothers when it was not

Blocked, From 1978 Mpasu worked at Lever Bros (now Unilever) in various capacities until 1988 when he was seconded to run the Malawi Confederation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry (MCCCI). In 1991, while working for Xerographics.

he joined a secret group headed by Bakili Muluzi whose aim was to build up opposition to Banda. When the United Democratic Front was voted into government in 1994, Mpasu was elected Member of Parliament for Ntcheu Central, and appointed Minister of Education and Government Chief

Whip in Parliament.He later served as Minister of Commerce and Speaker of the Malawi House of Assembly. His appointment as Minister of Commerce met with a lot of resistance since he was the Speaker of the House at that time.The court attempted to block President Bakili Muluzi

from posting him to this position.On April 8, 1997 whilst he was UDF Secretary General, during a strike in which civil servants were demanding higher salaries as recommended by the Chatsika Report, he was pelted with stones in Zomba while driving to the Parliament Building.

He was hit in the jaw.In 2008 a Malawian court sentenced him to a six-year prison sentence over charges of corruption and abuse of office dating back 14 years.He was accused of receiving kickbacks and failing to use normal channels of awarding contracts for

awarding a British company, Fieldyork,a deal to provide Malawi with millions of notebooks and pencils when he served as Minister of However, his incarceration was received with ambivalence after having been tried prior to the 2008 court case while he was Minister as a gesture to

Clear his name. D.D. Phiri, a prominent historian and writer in Malawi, wrote in the Nation on October 13, 2009: "In its 1994 manifesto, UDF pledged to introduce free primary education in Malawi.When he won the presidency, Bakili Muluzi appointed Sam Mpasu as Minister of Educati

The Minister of Education was more anxious than most people that exercise books and pencils be made available in time, otherwise the free primary schooling programme was going to fail." Mpasu was released from jail in 2010 instead of 2014 due to good behaviour.

There was something odd about the fallen politician’s Fieldyork conviction and subsequent sentencing. Only a few people appeared to sympathise with him.Even the party which he had been its spokesperson before he was stripped of the position seemed not to commiserate with his

welfare, perhaps because he had somehow turned against it in his apparent pursuit of truth, justice and intra-party democracy.About Muluzi’s desire to stand again for a third time, Mpasu was quoted by the Voice of America as saying: “The Constitution, specifically in Section 83,

Subsection three, says that a president or a vice-president will serve a maximum of two consecutive terms.There is no dispute about that because he serves a maximum of two consecutive terms, but the legal minds seem to have different interpretations of that.

That was obviously some sort of peculiar confidence because it was a time when almost every top member of UDF could not get the guts to say anything that would displease the former head of state(Bakili Muluzi). But Mpasu noted that Malawi might be plunged into legal battles

and an avoidable constitutional crisis if Muluzi got his wish to stand again.Yet afterwards, few people seemed to see any sense in the fallen politician’s proclamations and his conviction during the Bingu wa Mutharika administration

stemming from the Muluzi era—became a social podium where different individuals and organisations thought time had come to make names.A legitimate legal process was followed in the trial, yet there are those who believe Mpasu was simply a victim of political persecution as many

people involved in corrupt practices at the time were scot-free.Questions were being asked at the time: Are all those high-profile politicians occupying high positions in different capacities coming clean as long as corruption in the Muluzi era is concerned?

While at Prison, Mpasu was almost completely forgotten on the political scene. this was the time when some would argue, he needed moral support most. He did not deserve to be forgotten because his name has to always stand out in the history of Malawi just as those of many other

Malawians who fought relentlessly for the introduction of multiparty politics. After being sent to prison in 2008, he still felt he was a political prisoner, because of his fervent opposition to some of Bingu’s policies which he thought were erroneous.

D.D. Phiri once argued that mercy should be greater than justice in his attempt to appeal to government to release Mpasu from prison. He is said to have been crucified by a party that he had been part of its formation.Mpasu was found dead in his house on 15 February 2018.

May his soul continue to rest in perfect peace.

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