Doctors must examine Mutharika’s mental ability –PP
Some Malawians fear President Bingu wa Mutharika, 78, maybe suffering from a form of dementia that is robbing him of the ability to provide leadership and the burgeoning opposition Peoples Party (PP) of the State Vice President Joyce Banda has requested the cabinet to quickly appoint independent medical practitioners to assess the first citizen.
The doctors are requested to examine Mutharika if he is still able to discharge the powers and duties of the highest office.
The party says its request comes following Mutharika’s recent strange conduct which among others includes calling his own people chickens and his continued contradictions where he says one thing today only to say that he did not actually say it the next day.
Peoples Party’s youth wing which is called Orange Movement says in a statement its request is also in line with the Section 87 of the Malawi Constitution which gives powers to the Cabinet to sign written declaration certified by a board of independent medical practitioners that the President is unable to discharge the duties of the President.
“We, Orange Movement, feel that chances are high that our President might be unfit to continue working in that high office and that the public might not know that our President is incapacitated and as result the public will keep on criticizing the President for his failures,” states the statement which has been signed by Joseph Chikwemba, National Director of the wing.
The statement further adds: “The president might be unfit to continue working in that office due to the way he is conducting himself. It is not exaggerating to say that the behavior our President Bingu wa Mutharika is becoming very strange to every reasonable person. The President has been behaving strangely for a very long time now, just recently he insulted the suffering people of Malawi by calling them chickens, seriously how can a whole Head of State make such comments.”
The party says it fears for the President because he might be living in denial and that he is probably unfit to solve the current social-political crisis.
PP wants cabinet to allow a board of independent medical practitioners to certify Mutharika mentally and physically healthy.
“It is our hope that we will not be misunderstood as we are only calling this exercise out of good will in order to make sure that the public should still have strong faith and confidence in our president,” the statement said.
