Malawi marks 50 years of independence next Monday. But the country is hardly independent in any meaningful sense. It heavily relies on donor support and international NGOs. It is these foreigners, not the citizens, who are in charge of the country’s governance

Successive presidents of Malawi have undertaken zealous campaigns to rehabilitate the country’s first president, Kamuzu Banda. However, unquestioningly accepting positive depictions of his presidency increase the risk of forgetting past atrocities and make the country vulnerable to future governmental abuses of power