Who Told The Development Worker Poem by Isaac Maliya

That the ghettos
Have scaled eyes
To see the mammoth gap
Between the engaged and disengaged?
What a myth, yet same eyes!

That the North’s
6th Century old citadels
Are rebuilt annually
For having employed
The rife “low cost” materials
What a lie, yet we realise!

That the uplift
Needed by Africa now
Should be in hundreds
But the North’s was in billions?
What a difference, yet same dollar!

That the North’s periphery
Lifted-off without gasoline?
The heartthrob of development
What a slow mind
Oh! African development worker!

Dedication: To all humanity who strive
to see Africa awakened from her
deep slumber of economic backwardness.

Tuesday,29th January 1991.
Chapananga, Chikwawa, Malawi.