For the love of flags

Amid the harrowing images emerging from Afghanistan this week are stories of people demonstrating against the removal of the Afghan flag. Lives were lost in Jalalabad earlier this week and people are returning to the streets today on what should be a celebration of independence day.

Over the last few years, the sight of flags has often been a point of frustration and disappointment for me. But these demonstrations struck me because the flag-waving was an act of defiance, an act of hope. For them, red, black and green are the colours of a better nation. They have a brighter vision for their country and, for all the present shadows, they fly a flag to promote that ideal.

Donor dependency or demanded recognition?

As you move around Malawi, aside from her own red, black and green, the country displays the flags of many countries. Clinics, school blocks, roads, police units, power plants and, of course, NGO vehicles bear the flags of their generous donor nations. Principally the US, UK and European Union, but many more besides. 

A lot is said about donor dependency, and it can be seen from the top of government to a lakeside village. However, life is lived with the constant reminder that the vital services you depend on are there by the charity of someone else. If you pick up a newspaper, the pages are filled with photographs of foreign governments and organisations handing over donations of medical, education, food, shelter or other vital supplies. Many of which also fly the flag of their donors. How can you tackle dependency while insisting on dehumanising signs and ceremonies that remind people that they live by the generosity of others?

Vaccine nationalism

This has come to a head in the last few months as COVID-19 vaccines have begun arriving in the country. Priced out of the market to buy their own vaccines by wealthier nations, Malawi relies upon donations from other countries either through COVAX or directly. Vaccines arrive into Malawi in a relative trickle compared to the flow in nations that were able to buy up supplies in advance. Each time a consignment arrives it is met by a delegation of Malawi Government officials, NGO leads and diplomats from the country that provided them. Pallets of flag-adorned doses pause on the tarmac for a photo opportunity, before making their way around the country. 

Vaccine hesitancy is high in Malawi, in part because of fears about the motives of other countries in sending these vaccines. We are grateful to have received two doses of the vaccine because that meant we had access to the doses and trustworthy information to make our choice to receive them. That is a rare privilege in a country where only 1.6% of people are fully vaccinated.

You might receive two doses of a UK-researched vaccine, through a UK-sponsored vaccine programme, in a UK Aid-funded hospital, but that will not give you the same freedom to travel. As global travel opens up again the rules are stacked against nations like Malawi. As Malawi makes its own decisions on how to respond to the pandemic, these external barriers to trade and tourism mean national resources are limited by the decisions of the same ‘donor countries’.

One of the ‘measures’ for travel safety is the percentage of a country that is vaccinated. Yet the UK and others are now putting their foot on the supply pipe again by beginning a booster programme. The third dose for some, while only 1.3% of people in resource-poor countries have even received a single dose.

Apparently, the UK government expenditure on union flags has increased in recent years. I can’t help but feel that the values that red, white and blue are supposed to portray have diminished in the same period. While refugees from countries in turmoil are abandoned, when vital vaccines are hoarded and when the rules of the new normal are weighted toward wealth, no amount of flag-waving will build a nation.

A more personal reflection

When you leave your passport country, you expect your idea of national identity to change. Events of the last few years mean that the process has been somewhat expedited. While I can observe the inequalities in my new home country, they are never truly mine. My passport, my flag, means I can get on a plane and leave those inequalities behind.

Personally, I don’t class the UK, Malawi or any country as a Christian nation. The theology behind such a statement seems lacking. However, Christians are called a holy nation. 

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.

1 Peter 2:9

Christian or not, we could set aside the colours of our flag and champion the better ideas we wish our flags to represent, like valuing human dignity. But as Christians in particular there are plenty of current nationalistic tendencies which go against our call to be a holy nation. We have a responsibility to expect better as we proclaim the excellencies of him who called us. In a time where global news displays such darkness, I hope for such marvellous light.