Forget about President Lazarus Chakwera delivering an address at the United Nations General Assembly (Unga) in front of an empty hall in that magnificent skyscraper on the banks of the East River in New York’s Lower Manhattan.
No one really desires to listen to a speech by someone whose voice seldom matters in global affairs, let alone an African president who will simply be begging for financial aid.
Unga is a serious platform where serious issues are discussed. Thus, delegates are only interested in listening to what will have a serious impact in global issues.
Former Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe once went blunt in the assembly and accused other world leaders of ignoring the views of ‘lesser’ leaders by staying away from the UN hall when the ‘lesser’ leaders deliver their speeches.
But that is exactly what happens when you cannot do anything on your own. Why should China, the United States, the United Kingdom or Germany sit in the UN chamber and listen to speeches from leaders who will not bring anything to their countries?
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By the way, even the time leaders such as Chakwera are given within which they should make their speeches is different from what others such as the USA’s Joe Biden are given.
The truth is that Unga is a club of giants, and we all know that Chakwera is not one of them.
They discuss big issues at that forum and the outcomes are clearly gauged afterwards.
As far as Unga is concerned, Chakwera is a low man on the totem pole and it should not be surprising that when he delivered his speech in that global meeting, many delegates chose to busy themselves with something else.
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But that is not the main issue in this piece.
Today, let us celebrate our Malawianness, especially as this is the tourism month.
There is a lot to be proud of as a country. We are endowed with the third-largest freshwater lake in Africa and the ninth in the world.
We have striking rivers, mountains and wildlife reserves which other countries do not. While we remain one of the poorest countries in the world, we find some solace in our resilience in the face of troubles.
During this tourism month, it is only necessary that we pay attention to everything attractive in our country.
It must start with us. We are the best tourists and we must take time to patronise sites that we have. Afterwards, foreign tourists will be attracted to visit the sites.
But there also are several things that keep tourists away from visiting places that were supposed to be attracting them.
The road networks to may locations which could otherwise be heavily patronised by visitors are bad. As a country, we have failed to significantly invest in infrastructure that would boost our tourism sector.
Lake Malawi, this most beautiful water body in southern Africa, does not even have a vessel that travellers can be using at will.
Imagine the number of local and international tourists who would be cruising on the lake if there was a reliable and modern vessel plying on the freshwaters.
It is even surprising that we seriously talk about tourism when we neglect everything that attracts tourists.
We need to learn from countries such as Mauritius that got determined to develop their tourism sectors and did everything they could to invest in their sector.
Here, it appears our focus is not sustainable.
There was time tourism was being presented as a priority sector for economic development. In essence, that meant ample attention should be paid to the sector for it to start making a significant contribution to our gross domestic product.
So far, there is nothing that shows we are serious about reaping maximum benefits from tourism. Government, as the major stakeholder, has not done enough to boost this sector.
Some people who visit this country wonder why there is no modern vessel on our beautiful lake. They cannot even understand why roads to attractive sites are in dilapidated conditions.
Prices of goods and services in tourist attraction sites are also prohibitive.
There is a lot to celebrate about our country, especially this tourism month. Even the pomp spearheaded by the Ministry of Tourism has been top-notch.
But the fact remains that in terms of tourism, we are far from the status were we can be described as a proper tourist attraction country.
Nature did its part by endowing us with a beautiful lakes, vast wildlife reserves and smiley faces. It is just that authorities are failing to focus on how they can attract people to interesting sites.
