Already, the story is leading the nation into speculation chaos. An unidentified caller called The Nation at about 1.35 pm, on July 13, 2010, calling him an ‘impostor.’ Yet the caller isn’t the only one speculating.
Some are saying he just wants to claim a share in the wealth Kamuzu left. Others contend that the man harbours scorching political desires; that he wants to use Kamuzu’s name to gain popular acceptance.
But, according to media reports, the man is not in the country to seek a fortune.
"I am not interested in the financial issues related to my father," he told The Nation. And he continued: "I have no political ambitions as of now."
The story of Jim Jumani Johansson, the 37-year-old who claims to be Kamuzu’s son, isn’t just a story of a man searching for his hidden identity, or a story of one, as some allude, seeking political and economic fortunes from weaknesses of a silent history.
Johansson’s story exposes how much we don’t question the lives of the people we elect into leadership. Consequently, we end up being led by people we don’t really know.
"He is my father and I am ready to take a DNA test and prove to whoever doubts my claim," challenged Johansson.
"I have never heard of him," responded Khumbize Chiponda, Kamuzu’s grandniece, "and I don’t know who has in our family." And the Kamuzu’s family has challenged Johansson to produce his mother.
The failure of Kamuzu’s family to help solve the Johansson’s riddle left the nation waiting for a word from Mama Cecilia Tamanda Kadzamira, the woman who was Kamuzu’s long-time confidante and official hostess.
But when the woman we all expected to provide the lasting solution only sounded ‘surprised by the query’ after being contacted, we knew that Johansson’s story is a hard nut to crack.
Of course, some might end up thinking of writing books titled, ‘The Mysteries of Kamuzu’s Life,’ to reflect the claims, denials and surprises that Kamuzu’s life is generating, but such mysteries shouldn’t be narrowed to Kamuzu only. Why?
It is not just Kamuzu Banda whose life has been wrapped in coats of mysteries. From John Chilembwe to President Bingu wa Mutharika, there are a lot of unanswered questions about our leaders in Malawi.
There is just so much we don’t really know, and we don’t even care to question, about most of the people that have been involved in the leadership of the country.
Mysteries of our leaders
Was John Chilembwe killed?
No one to date can claim to posses an apparent answer to the question. Self-acclaimed historian, Grant Chirambo, once claimed that Chilembwe was not killed but fled to the US, a move engineered by Joseph Booth, Chilembwe’s long time friend.
DD Phiri, one of the country’s renowned historians, disputed the claim, arguing Chilembwe was killed. He even challenged Chirambo to come up with evidence to support his claim.
The death of John Chilembwe is still a mystery. Likewise is the actual date when Kamuzu was born.
There has been conflicting dates emerging from different quarters. Some claim he was born in 1898. Others say he was born in 1906. When was he born? And why are we not able to know this bit about our country’s first president?
And then there is a story of Banda’s long walk to South Africa. What actually moved him to leave the country? Is it true he left the country because of the frustration he suffered at the hands of his teacher, Cullen Young? It is said that Young suspended Kamuzu from writing an examination, accusing him of cheating.
But did Kamuzu really cheat? Or it was, indeed, his short stature that forced him to stand so that he could see the board in the distant front, something Young interpreted as cheating?
Anyway, at what age did he leave home? Did he travel alone all along? What did his parents say? Did they encourage him to go ahead? Or they weren’t comfortable with the journey? Who was he staying with in Zimbabwe, in South Africa?
To date, it is still difficult to get a scholarship to study abroad. Somebody, or an organisation, must have your backing to get it. But almost all our three presidents have had the chance of getting higher education abroad.
Let us consider Banda first. How did he get to the US? And which family in the US kept him? Who paid for his school fees and upkeep?
It is said that Banda travelled to the US in 1923 and earned a high school diploma from Wilberforce Academy in 1928. Three years later in 1931, while working as a Bantu language advisor at the University of Chicago, he earned a doctorate degree.
But the period of three years is too short for someone with a high school diploma to earn a doctorate degree. What kind of doctorate degree was that?
The same question can be asked about Mutharika. We know where Mutharika did his primary school; we know he did his secondary education at Dedza Secondary School.
But what we don’t know much is how he finished secondary education at Dedza and found himself in India. What kind of student was he in India? Was he sporty, outgoing or studious?
Still, where did he actually obtain his economics doctorate degree? Was it at the University of New Delhi in India, or it was at the Pacific Western University in the US?
Muluzi, too, has a number of unanswered questions. Print journalists writing his brief history like to say that he was educated in a number of primary and secondary schools in his home district. Which schools are these? Can’t we name them?
Others advance that Muluzi went to Malosa Secondary School in Zomba. Which years? And again, Muluzi later received a diploma in technical education in Britain and Denmark. When did he do it? At what schools in Denmark and Britain?
So much can be asked, again, about how our leaders conducted themselves while abroad. What was their youth like? Did they personally think about the plight in Malawi while abroad?
Why did Dr. Banda decide to practice his medicine in Ghana when his country too had no doctors? Was he searching for fortunes? Why did Banda say if the people had accepted the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, he would have sworn never to come back to Nyasaland?
What serious squabble did Mutharika pick with Dr Banda that not only forced him to exile himself for decades, but also to change his name?
While in exile, was Mutharika thinking about Malawi?
These questions about our leaders are endless. They are just so many, on almost every topic and they still make some of the stories about our leaders a mystery.
Search for reason
Why is it that we don’t know much about our leaders? The culture of fear can be the first reason. It began with Kamuzu Banda, the country’s first elected president.
Banda consolidated his power through instilling fear in his people. He had a powerful mechanism of propaganda that in the end made people view him as somebody supernatural.
No one can prove that Chilembwe gave any hint on Dr Banda’s return. But the famous Martyrs Day play Chilembwe on MBC Radio had a line stipulating that Chilembwe prophesied that a messiah, meaning Kamuzu, would come to save his people.
As a child, I remember being continuously warned by my mother about respecting Kamuzu. She seriously warned never to mention the name Kamuzu in public, never to point at his portrait or picture with a finger. Why? I would ask. "Kamuzu has eyes and ears all over. He will catch you," she would say.
Such heavenly images of Kamuzu completely secluded the leader from his people. Malawians accepted Kamuzu as a messiah, somebody supernatural, almost a god.
Coupled with increased arrests and systematic killings of dissidents, a spirit of fear than respect of our leader was born in the people.
And Kamuzu and his closest aides capitalised on the people’s fear to their political advantage. Which Malawian journalist could dare interview Kamuzu to narrate his rather troubled beginnings?
One British journalist dared once to ask the Ngwazi on a number of African issues of governance. The Ngwazi repeatedly said; "I can’t answer that," to the different questions the journalist asked.
This was typical of Kamuzu—he chose what to give to his people. But why? One, he knew saying too much would easily expose his weaknesses to people and as a result, he won’t be considered a ‘messiah’ anymore. Two, he wanted to enhance fear of him than respect.
That spirit of fear Kamuzu instilled in the people because he wanted to be viewed as a messiah has developed into a culture where a leader is afraid to be open to his people and the people fear their leader. Malawians fail to know their leaders because of this culture.
How often has Mutharika, as a president, given an exclusive interview to a private media house just to tell his story to the people? It is always press conferences. And which journalist can dare ask Mutharika during a press conference to talk about his youth and his personal exploits?
The country’s culture of fear has been worsened by the fact that Malawians generally have no interest in writing their own history. There are quite a number of leaders with mysteries around them and big stories to tell. But rarely do you hear them telling their stories to unfold the mysteries.
Kamuzu, despite his respect and admiration for history, never left a biography to tell his story. And so did Aleke Banda, another figure gone with a powerful story of the nation.
These biographies do not just help unfold the mysteries surrounding our leaders. They are also a powerful reference for history.
Costs of mysteries?
Do our leader’s mysteries affect the nation? The answer is hidden in the story of Jim Jumani Johansson. The man is only trying to be accepted into the family he claims he belongs.
But in this search for his identity, almost every Malawian has been, or will be, affected in a number of ways.
The process of establishing the truth about his identity involves medical and court analysis. All these demand quite some spending from the taxpayers’ money. And again, the story is capitalising on the domestic weaknesses of our history. We are the guardians of our history. Yet Johansson’s story tells us how distanced we are to it.
Yet true or not true, Jim Jumani Johansson story is a good entry of our history. It is a story that tells our leaders to tell their stories to their people so that we stitch patchworks of popular histories into a history of nation.
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