Mary Chilima was one of the only two students to earn an automatic entry into the doctorate programme at the Gordon Institute of Business Studies.

She also earned six distinguished academic awards, becoming the graduate with most awards on the graduation day.

Mary is wife to Vice-President Saulos Chilima. She is an ardent reader.

She was born on November 3 1980 in Zingwangwa Township, Blantyre.

The award winner broke records at the University of Pretoria last week as she graduated with her second master’s degree with distinction.

Mary comes from a family of two children. A few years after having her younger brother, their parents separated.

Raising two children as a single parent, her mother Margaret Kamoto instilled in the duo the importance of perseverance and hard work in all their endeavours.

Subsequently, she maintained top positions in class and was the best performer with 13 points at Our Lady of Wisdom Secondary School in Blantyre in 1996.

She also received the most awards at the end of that year and her current achievement is reminiscent of that moment 27 years ago.

Following her remarkable secondary school completion, she was selected to pursue her first choice of Business Administration at the University of Malawi’s Polytechnic, becoming the youngest in her class.

Mary (2nd from L) at her graduation

“After my first degree, I worked for the Reserve Bank of Malawi under Malswitch. I then moved to the First Capital Bank and then to Standard Bank.

“During this time, I attained a professional diploma in marketing from the Chartered Institute of Marketing [CIM] and later, a Master of Science in Strategic Management from the University of Derby. These qualifications were attuned to my career aspirations at the time,” she explains.

In 2013, she opted out of the rat race to potentially pursue a career in education, albeit at the entry level of nursery and primary school.

However, she did not pursue that dream; instead, as Second Lady of Malawi, she opted to continue working on her entrepreneurial endeavours.

Now Mary runs two retail clothing stores called Exquisite Edge in Lilongwe and Blantyre and has recently also developed an interest in the mining industry.

Despite all this, the desire to pursue a career in education, particularly academia still beckoned her.

As such, with support and encouragement from her husband, family and her close friend Thokozani Unyolo, she embarked on a journey to attain the doctoral degree in business management with a view to become a professor of business studies one day.

Mary observes that this inherent dream has been passed down from a long line of teachers and lecturers in her family.

“Both my great grandfather Vito Mtuwana and my grandmother Mary Mtuwana Kamoto were teachers, whereas my mother was a lecturer at the Malawi University of Business and Applied Sciences (Mubas) for 20 years. I too dabbled in lecturing at a private college in my younger years, which whetted my appetite for teaching,” she says.

She cites that the newly acquired qualification—a Master of Philosophy in Business Management—is therefore, a stepping-stone towards higher academic ambitions.

“Attaining it with a distinction as well as with numerous awards, cements my belief that I am on the right path to achieving my dream. The awards span from individual modules to being the top student as well as producing the best research paper in my cohort. It was also humbling to note that in my graduation session, I received the most awards. As the only Malawian in my cohort, I was extremely proud of this achievement,” says the mother of two.

And while acknowledging she may be privileged in many ways that others, Mary adds that her greatest lesson thus far is that with determination, hard work and perseverance, dreams can be realised.

“Having a hard-working mother who was not limited by her gender, allowed me to recognise that being a girl needs not limit my dreams. I also acknowledge that having a supportive spouse who encourages and enables the attainment of my ambitions makes all this possible.

“Having the right types of friends also encourages one’s ambitions.  I am surrounded by family and friends who continue to thrive in their respective careers and I do not want to be left behind. Though I am honoured to be Malawi’s Second Lady, I recognise that if I can do more, I should,” she adds.

Despite her practice of encouraging others to follow their dreams, Mary is aware that many young Malawians are faced with innumerable challenges in their quest for education.

She further confesses that the playing field is tipped against the youth in the country.

She adds: “Progression towards higher education is not guaranteed as they find themselves competing for secondary school selection. I hope that ongoing plans to increase the number of secondary schools will eradicate this challenge, thus allowing all children to automatically proceed to a secondary school of their choice.”

Nonetheless, she notes that the problem persists at tertiary level and hopes that like-minded individuals will join hands and embark on building and implementing a note-worthy private university to complement existing institutions.

Mary would be happy to partner with others in such an endeavour.

The current challenges notwithstanding, the Second Lady encourages girls to continue pursuing education, resist early marriages and those seemingly easier paths.

She says she equally faced numerous challenges growing up, explaining that despite going mostly to private schools, the availability of school fees was not always guaranteed.

“My mother would finish her day job and then conduct evening classes to make ends meet. She later started her own secretarial college—Maggie’s Commercial School, thus introducing me to entrepreneurship.

“I would leave early in the morning to mop the floors at Maggie’s before proceeding to school.  While in university, I spent my holidays learning and teaching at my mother’s secretarial college,” she says.

A key take-away she got from that period is that success requires humility—that one needs to be willing to get their hands dirty to get the job done.

“I have carried this attitude in all my endeavours and attribute my success to it. It also helps that my husband is down to earth and humble, as he is always ready to serve others, paying no mind to his position. Fellow churchgoers can attest to this,” says the aspiring academician.

Furthermore, she implores the youth to refrain from early marriages, drug and alcohol abuse.

“Life changes constantly. Wealth and positions are not guaranteed, but an education cannot be erased. There is a time for everything and in an era of instant gratification, patience and prayer are key,” she concludes.

The post Mary Chilima: earns second masters, wins awards first appeared on The Nation Online.