There is a story about Marco Francis Kanjo and Emily Nyamazao Maliwa. The story remains unverified, as both are no longer alive to confirm or refute it. Yet the anecdote has endured in private recollections, passed down through individuals who later testified that they had heard the account directly from Marco Francis Kanjo.
During the one-party era, Marco Francis Kanjo would go on to serve as Assistant General Manager at the Malawi Housing Corporation (MHC), later working as a high-ranking official at the Blantyre City Assembly. Under President Bakili Muluzi’s administration, he became a Commissioner with the Malawi Electoral Commission. But this story predates those appointments. It takes us back to London in 1963.
Here is the story:
Around 1963, when JZU Tembo was serving as Parliamentary Secretary (Deputy Minister) for Finance, he travelled to London on official duties. He checked in at the Cumberland Hotel in Marble Arch. At the time, Kanjo and his close friend Jaspar Mbekeani were pursuing diploma studies at University College London.
Upon his arrival, JZU Tembo contacted Mbekeani and invited him for drinks. JZU Tembo told Mbekeani to come along with Marco Francis Kanjo. JZU knew both and their families very well from Nyasaland. The evening passed with bottles of beer. Eventually, the three men parted ways.
On his journey home, Kanjo encountered Emily Maliwa, who was then studying for her M.Phil. at the University of London (SOAS). In a casual conversation on a train, Kanjo mentioned that he had just been drinking with JZU Tembo and Mbekeani. He then voiced criticism of JZU Tembo, questioning how a bachelor’s degree holder in a field unrelated to economics or finance could be entrusted with the post of Deputy Minister of Finance, when, in his view, more technically qualified individuals were available.
The following day, JZU Tembo invited Mbekeani again and requested him to come along with Kanjo. When the two arrived at the hotel lounge, JZU Tembo confronted Kanjo directly. According to the account, JZU Tembo angrily accused Kanjo of bad-mouthing him to “a Malawian lady on the train” after their previous meeting, adding that he had heard everything.
Kanjo, it is said, was mortified—so embarrassed that he wished the floor would open and swallow him.
The lingering question, of course, is this: how did JZU Tembo learn of the private remarks against him made in a train carriage?
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NB:
According to Dr Louis Nthenda and Dr John Lwanda, later Emily Maliwa confided to Prof. George Shepperson that, shortly before Malawi’s independence, a high-powered delegation from the Nyasaland Government travelled to London to present her with a proposal that she should return home to assume the role of the country’s First Lady (Dr Kamuzu Banda’s wife) upon attaining independence on 6 July 1964.
In light of this account, it invites speculation whether JZU Tembo’s 1963 trip to London—during which he met socially with Kanjo and Mbekeani—might have coincided with, or been connected to, the mission that Emily Maliwa mentioned about to Prof. George Shepperson.
# Lost History Foundation.
