It is a simple fact that the number of guys refusing to marry is directly proportional to the number of ladies that are single and searching, reason being that it is these single guys that have refused to marry that ought to marry the single ladies that are searching and praying for husband.

My personal study into this recent development showed that most Malawian organisation boss who are mostly men above 45years, prefer to hirer pretty single ladies for non-engineering positions, which put guys in the non-engineering sectors at high risk of not securing good jobs when competing with ladies for same job position.

I also discovered that most multinational firms have a policy that encourages female gender empowerment, which make their HR team give preferential treatment to ladies seeking for same position with a male job applicant during recruitment exercise.

You can hardly discover this secret organisation policy until you are among the top management.If you doubt this, try and go to Victoria Avenue in Blantyre during close of work; 5 – 6pm (Monday – Friday), and you will notice higher number of young pretty females leaving their office premises in good cars, with few young guys leaving their workplaces in a car.

If you are observant enough, you will also discover that most of the male workers driving home from work are usually within the age range of: 38 – 60yrs, whereas more ladies within the age range of; 25 – 35yrs drive home from work, showing that more young ladies now have better jobs than guys.
This is also applicable to Lilongwe: same study was carried out within Central Business Zomba, CBD.

To many Malawians, especially the ladies, it is a good trend; at least to them, it shows that ladies are becoming independent from guys, and to the old working class male directors and managers, it means nothing because they are at the receiving end (sleeping with these young pretty ladies for jobs, promotion, contracts, etc), but not until their own daughter(s) graduate from SA, London or the USA and returns back home to take up an executive position in her dad’s big firm, but only to go to bed every night weeping and soaking her pillows with tears simply because there is no responsible young man in her life ready to walk her to the altar and they live happily ever after like she reads from foreign novels and watch on Nigerian movie series.

No wonder many rich parents are now arranging marriage for their daughters; yet this doesn’t solve the imminent problem of abnormal increase in single young people in Malawi of today.

Now, what am I blabbing about? The major reason we have increasing rate of single ladies in Malawi today is not because witches in the villages have increased in number and now pursuing single ladies and stopping them from finding suitable husbands just as many modern pastors make these single ladies to believe in order to extort money from them & to grow their congregation, it is not even because single ladies of today lack good character or manner, neither is it because single ladies now dress indecently….nope, the major reason is harsh economy that is no longer favouring young single guys!

How do we expect a guy who graduated from higher institution and living with his parents after 3 years and still unable to rent a decent apartment for himself, unable to cater for his own daily needs to think about getting married in this time and age?

How do we expect a young guy who after 4 to 5 years of passing out from Poly is yet to secure a job that pays him up to a hundred thousand Kwacha, and give him the opportunity of saving at least fifty thousand Kwacha every month to wish to marry and give birth to children?

The earlier we Malawians realise the dangers of having more young guys without good job, the better for us as a nation that wish to grow and have a happy, crime-free society.I know some people will say: marriage is not everyone, while others will argue that must everybody marry? And the answer is yes, anybody who desires to marry ought to marry, but is that the case today? No!

Many young men want to marry, but the truth is that their pocket isn’t encouraging to take that bold step that marriage requires.

Some will also argue that must you wait till you have millions before you marry? And some will argue that marriage is not about money, but tell me: how do you sustain the kids that will follow after the wedding? How do you plan to pay for house rent, children increasing school fees, etc?

Do you want to plan the future of your kids on one rich relation or friend? That’s unfair to the unborn innocent children you want to bring to life, please don’t do it!

I know that not every guy or lady will be rich, but being comfortable to provide most of your needs should be compulsory at least!

I still remember the story of Adam and Eve which I read from “The Book of My Bible Stories” while I was a kid, it told us how God created man, Adam and gave him everything he needed and Adam will go to his garden in the morning to return at night lonely, such that God pitied him and said: it is not good for him to be alone, I will make him a help mate, and so God made Adam to fall deep asleep and then God came and removed one of Adam’s ribs and made Eve for him.

Adam woke up and saw Eve and was excited and said: this is the bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh (dunno if I quoted those words correctly).

What am I trying to say? God gave Adam his basic needs before sending him a woman!

A man deserves to have his basic needs met before thinking of getting married.

But it is so shameful that old married men in Malawi occupying top positions in various organisations and firms gave and still giving jobs to single unmarried ladies who most times contribute nothing to the organisation’s growth, thereby causing more unemployment and underemployment of young single Malawian guys, with a resultant effect of late marriage amongst these young single guys.

Shameful enough, many organisations today hire ladies by their physical attraction; once a member of the HR team admires the female applicant, whether she merits the job or not, he must ensure that she gets hired to the disadvantage of her male counterparts who most times have better skills to offer to the organisation.

THE SOLUTION

First, we must tell ourselves the truth: in Malawian culture and norm, men are believed and expected to be the breadwinner of the family; the woman is only expected to assist and contribute if she has and can.
Bearing this in mind, majority if not all Malawian single ladies searching for a life partner want and desire to marry a guy earning higher income than them.

All things being equal, no Malawian single lady prays to marry a guy she’s earning more than; very uncommon in Malawi.But then, we have few single guys in Malawi who earn that kind of income most Malawian single ladies desire from their preferred partner. And as it stands presently in Malawi, more single ladies between the age range of 25yrs – 35yrs have better paying jobs than single guys of the same age range, which means many single ladies in Malawi will never find husband to marry except they lower their taste and marry a guy earning below them or they become second wife to older men.
All these anomalies were caused by older Malawian men who set the wrong legacy for this nation in terms of bad leadership, sex-for-job in favour of single ladies, and more…and for this status quo to change, every Malawian citizen must play a role to bring the much desired change we dream of in Malawi, how?

1. As a young single lady working in a company, say no to the maltreatment of young single guys in your organisation because the more these guys are penalised and made not to grow, the more chances of you, your single sister, niece, friend or even aunt not finding a deserving husband to marry.

2. All HR personnel must ensure equity and fairness when hiring applicants for any job position. Stop the female gender empowerment; enough is enough, its not helping Malawi, neither is it helping the world in general.

Women are happier when their husband or man is in charge financially than when they are in charge…even in Europe!

3. As a single lady, lower your financial expectation from guys- the table is turning, fewer guys now have good means of income compared to ladies; you ladies asked for gender equality, you now have it, please make use of it, don’t wait for a richer guy…if you are driving and you see a guy trekking whom you fancy, lift him and don’t be shy to startup a focused-relationship with him…waiting for the richer guys driving bigger cars than yours may keep you waiting for eternity and may bring you more heartbreak because such guys now know that they are king to women and so they treat ladies with little/no respect.

4. Encourage your single brothers to work hard, acquire skill, learn trade and explore business opportunities even if they are working. Help them with business startup capital…doing so will help create a deserving husband for a fellow single lady out there.

5. Stop squandering that single guy’s money!

Advice him to invest his income wisely! Encourage him to startup a side business to assist his salary because no salary is enough!

6. As a single guy, learn to be financially wise!

Quit those useless habits that drains your income! Quit smoking! Quit drinking! Quit gambling! Quit womanising; its a costly hobby! Quit clubbing around town! Quit squandering money on any girl who isn’t your wife! Learn to invest, learn to nurture a business aside your job and learn to spend lesser than you earn! Don’t use your last savings to buy a car just to feel among or just to attract irrelevant ladies! Car is more of a necessity until you become rich! For now, buying car should be to aid your financial growth and not for fun or pleasure!

7. As a single lady, pray for your single brothers, boyfriend, lover, or male friends and colleagues. Advice and encourage them whenever you can.

It is no longer easy for single young guys in Malawi even though most of them won’t confess this to you due to male ego!

Let’s all wake up to the reality and pray that President Mutharika and his team bring about the positive change in Malawi’s economy to help curb this societal pressure.

Wish you all a blissful day ahead.