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(NYASATIMES) Renowned Malawi scholar honoured in Finland

Renowned Malawi scholar honoured in Finland
By Nyasa Times
Published: June 6, 2011

A renowned Malawian scholar in economics was among a group of six luminaries who have been honoured by the University of Helsinki in Finland for their contribution to global socio-economic development.

The university announced that Thandika Mkandawire, the Malawi-born London School of Economics African Development Professor, was decorated with an honorary (honoris causa) Doctor of Social Sciences at a colourful ceremony in Helsinki, the Finnish capital, on Friday evening. The ceremony was attended by the President of Finland,Tarja Halonen.

Thandika Mkandawire: Honoured in Finland

“Thandika Mkandawire is one of the best known and highly esteemed social scientists in the world with an African background,’ read the University Helsinki citation accompanying the honour.

“He has expanded his educational background of publications about the role of welfare policy in the development process and the prospects of democracy and social sciences in Africa,” it said.

Professor Mkandawire, the former Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESIA) Executive Secretary, told PANA in an exclusive interview that he was dedicating the honour to fellow scholars and academics who are fighting for academic freedom on the African continent.

“I am sharing this honour with colleagues in Africa, and in Malawi specifically, who are fighting for academic freedom,” he said.

This dedication could not have come at a better time for Malawian students and academics who are clocking 110 days of academic freedom struggle after Inspector General of Police Peter Mukhito summoned Associate Political Science Professor Blessings Chinsinga in connection with a classroom example he gave his class.

Dr. Chinsinga had reportedly told his class that insurrections that toppled governments in Tunisia and Egypt were caused by policy failures like the one that led to Malawi persistent fuel and foreign exchange reserves.

One of his students, a suspected planted informant, reported him to authorities, thus the summons from the top cop for the youthful academic.

In solidarity, several universities and research institutions across the globe held demonstrations and petitioned Malawi embassies.

CODESRIA even reacted by postponing an international Colloquium, scheduled for May, coincidentally in honour for Mkandawire over the same issue.

Mkandawire, who has just turned 70, was an active member of the nationalist movements and an editorial assistant to the late Aleke Banda, the founding editor of Malawi News who went on to found the leading Nation Publications Limited.

In 1961, Mkandawire was jailed for political activities against the colonial administration. After three months at the Zomba Central Prison, Mkandawire was released and he returned to Malawi News where he worked until 1962 when he obtained a scholarship to study journalism in the US.

Meanwhile, soon after Malawi gained independence from Britain in 1964, the new government of Hastings Kamuzu Banda was rocked by a cabinet revolt. While in the US, Mkandawire, alongside other Malawi students studying there, called for reconciliation after the so-called ‘Cabinet Crisis’.

In 1965, while working as a research assistant in Ecuador, Mkandawire learnt that the Malawi government had cancelled his passport and so he could not return to the US for his studies. He was compelled to seek political asylum in Sweden where he continued his studies and later went on to teach at the University of Stockholm.

In 1978, he moved to Dakar, Senegal and between 1982 and 1985 he was recruited by the government to advice in the setting up of the Zimbabwe Institute of Development.

This proximity to Malawi proved highly risky given the assassination campaign by the Banda regime at the time.

In 1986, Professor Mkandawire became Executive secretary of the Dakar, Senegal-based CODESIA, a position he held until 1996.

He then moved to Copenhagen, Denmark, where he became a senior research fellow at the Centre for Development Research. In 1998, he was appointed by the United Nations Secretary General as the Director of the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development in Geneva, Switzerland where he served for 11 years.

In 2009, he became the London School of Economics first-ever African chairman.

Professor Mkandawire remained in exile for 30 years and was only able to return to Malawi in 1993 after the referendum that led to the re-introduction of multi-party elections in 1994. Since then he has made it a point of returning home every year.

Born in 1940 of Malawian father from the northern mountainous district of Mzimba and a Zimbabwean mother, he has two adult children.—(Reporting by Ralphael Tenthani, Pana)

Labels: FINLAND, MALAWI

posted by MrK @ 4:54 PM