By Lewis Msasa
I would like to celebrate the life of Mussa Chiwaula, a patriotic Malawian and renowned disability rights campaigner who passed on in Gaborone, Botswana, on October 8 2024.
My earliest interaction with Chiwaula was during the formative years of my career, a couple of decades and a half ago. At that time, I was working at the Malawi Council for the Handicapped (Macoha), now Malawi Council for Disability Affairs.
One day, he invited me to accompany him to Gaborone, Botswana, for a weeklong international conference on disability. Little did I know that this opportunity was going to be a turning point in my career. The trip gave me a global perspective on handling communication related to disability issues. Apparently, this was my first time travelling outside Malawi—in a plane for that matter!
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At that time, Chiwaula was the executive director for the Federation of Disability Organisations in Malawi (Fedoma), an organisation he helped found and served for over 14 years. Until his death, Chiwaula led the Southern Africa Federation of the Disabled (Safod), a leading Southern African disability-focused network engaged in coordinating activities of organisations for disabled persons in the Southern Africa Development Community (Sadc) region. As director general, Chiwaula headed the Gaborone-based Safod secretariat, overseeing 10 SADC countries.
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Over the years, Chiwaula undertook a wide range of disability-related research activities championing disability issues across the Sadc region and beyond.
Despite all his accomplishments, one would expect Chiwaula to brag about them, considering the high profile post he held. Probably, he knew that doing so would be a futile effort, especially in a society which has a penchant for looking down upon the achievements of persons with disabilities.
Years ago, in one of our rare interactions, Chiwaula shared a moving story about an athlete with disability who went abroad to compete in the Paralympic Games. No one gave him a chance of even reaching the quarter finals, but this determined athlete made it to the finals and won a gold medal due to his stellar performance. Local newspapers in the country where the Games were held extensively reported on the exploits of this Malawian.
On the eve of departure, the athlete imagined the heroic welcome he was going to receive back home. He rehearsed how he was going to conduct himself on arrival, possible questions that sports journalists were going to ask him and the type of response he was going to give.
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Arriving at the airport, the athlete disembarked from the plane flashing his gold medal while excitedly waving at the imaginary crowd in the distance. To his dismay he was only welcomed by a handful of his relatives. He was not accorded the heroic welcome he expected.
After narrating the story, Chiwaula paused, probably to gauge my reaction. He told me that one would have expected this athlete to be accorded a hero’s welcome that his success story was hugely diminished by his disability
Chiwaula’s story might sound fictitious but it is a harsh reminder of how our society downplay each other’s efforts, especially those of persons with disabilities in various spheres of life.
Surely, we need to remove barriers— be they physical or psychological—which deter many people with disabilities from excelling in various spheres of life.
Rest in peace Mr Chiwaula.
