MALAWI: Lake Malawi Wrangles & more – 31st Dec 2024

Muli bwanji from BA! This is the Rorshok Malawi Update from the 31st of December twenty twenty-four. A quick summary of what's going down in Malawi.

Malawi and neighboring country Tanzania have been fighting over Lake Malawi for years now. Tanzania calls the north-eastern part of Lake Malawi - which borders the two countries - Lake Nyasa, although Malawi was previously called Nyasaland during the colonial period.

On Sunday the 29th, local news accused Moses Kunkuyu, Malawi's Minister of Information, of endorsing Tanzania’s new map, which depicts Lake Malawi as belonging to them. In his defense, Kunkuyu said he was in Tanzania to support its internet connectivity initiatives, and was tricked into posing for a picture with Nape Nnauye, Tanzania’s Information Minister, while holding Tanzania’s new map.

The Tanzanian government has since instructed all its government offices and schools to amend their curricula to depict the north-east of Lake Malawi as belonging to Tanzania. Many Malawian locals are enraged, but the government hasn’t said anything yet.

Next up, over 2,000 Mozambican citizens fled to Malawi on Wednesday the 25th to seek asylum from political unrest that has caused the deaths of over 200 people in Mozambique over the past two months.

Charles Kalemba, the Commissioner for the Department of Disaster Management Affairs, said they received a report from the District Commissioner for Ntcheu District in the Central Region. According to the report, the asylum-seekers were entering Malawi through a river that passes through Malawi and Mozambique, and the government is currently working out the logistics. However, most of them have already found refuge in local villages in Ntcheu, such as Mlolo, Tengani and Mbenje.

While some locals on social media have shown compassion for the asylum-seekers, some posts showed that others were afraid that they might threaten security if they lived amongst locals with no safety measures.

A move by President Lazarus Chakwera made him come off as uncaring and insensitive. On Christmas Day, on Wednesday the 25th, he pardoned twenty-two prisoners as part of Christmas celebrations, all of whom had served half of their sentences, were chronically ill, old, or had children with them in the prison cells.

However, a local news article hinted that the prisoners’ release might have been more than just a Christmas gift.

On Saturday the 28th, Masauko Wiscot, the Commissioner General of the Malawi Prison Service, said they have been facing recurrent challenges, including overcrowding of local prisons. He said this made it difficult to provide good health services, adequate food, and safe custody for the prisoners.

He also added that the Prison Services has high hopes for twenty twenty-five, as the EU has provided financial support for the construction of a new prison in Monkey Bay, a small town in the Mangochi district in the southern region.

Speaking of providing health services, on Monday the 30th, the Presidential Task Force on Public Health Emergencies said the country recorded 408 measles cases this year, with no deaths. The figures are alarming because, in comparison, the World Health Organization (or WHO) only recorded 173 measles cases between two thousand and twenty twenty-three in Malawi.

Both the WHO and the Task Force did not explain why there was a surge this year, but the Task Force said they have been implementing several measures, such as isolating the patients and giving out vaccines in the affected districts.

In our previous episode, we mentioned that there was a heatwave in Malawi that lasted for about eight days, with temperatures reaching as high as forty-two degrees Celsius or 108 degrees Fahrenheit. Luckily, starting on Friday the 27th, it rained in most parts of the Central and Southern Regions, bringing about much-needed cooler temperatures.

However, the Department of Climate Change and Meteorological Services warned that there could be flash floods. Their evening weather forecast on Monday the 30th said that the rains falling until the 5th of January are being influenced by the Congo air mass, which is causing thunderstorms, strong winds, and heavy rainfall. They have since warned people to stay indoors and avoid water bodies, as the weather may change suddenly.

On another note, the drastic weather patterns have impacted maize yields, and prices for the commodity have been increasing as a result. However, the government has made a move that might help.

On Tuesday the 31st, the Agricultural Development and Marketing Corporation (or Admarc), the state-produce-trader, opened 360 markets in the Central and Northern Regions.

Admarc sells various grains at cheaper rates and functions as a price stabilizer for market prices. For instance, a fifty-kilogram bag of maize currently costs between forty-five and seventy thousand Kwacha, which is between twenty-six and forty dollars, in local markets across the country. In contrast, Admarc is selling the same bag at nearly forty thousand Kwacha, which is twenty-three dollars.

Locals who don’t benefit from Admarc might find some comfort in the funding that the EU and Unicef have given Malawi to help build resilience for people affected by climate-induced shocks.

The funding, which amounts to a little over two million dollars, is targeting one million people in ten districts that were affected by El Nino weather last year. Many of these are located in the Southern Region, such as Blantyre, Machinga and Thyolo.

According to a joint statement released on Tuesday the 31st by the Malawian government, the EU and Unicef said that, of the one million beneficiaries, 600,000 will be children. They will receive life-saving interventions in nutrition, health, and child protection services.

The country experienced several sugar shortages in twenty twenty-four, but it seems that won’t be an issue next year as Salima Sugar Limited, one of Malawi’s top sugar suppliers, said it had increased its processing capacity by 600 metric tonnes per day. This means their processing capacity has come to 1,850 metric from 1,250 tonnes per day.

On Friday the 27th, Mwai Chagwira, the Sales Representative for Salima Sugar, confirmed the news. She said the expansion has been done to meet the growing demand for sugar.

Michael Usi, the country’s Vice President and former leader of the United Transformation Movement (or UTM), was expelled from the party.

In an older episode, we mentioned that the UTM Disciplinary Committee had summoned Usi for supporting the rival and ruling Malawi Congress Party. Usi was supposed to appear before the Committee on Monday the 30th, but on Sunday the 29th, he said he wouldn’t show up because the Committee was elected unconstitutionally, and is therefore illegal.

On Monday the 30th, the Committee went ahead with their meeting. They decided to expel Usi with immediate effect, and also advised him to stop identifying himself as a UTM member.

In trending news, Dr Noel Kayira, the Police Commissioner for the South-West Region, has banned police officers from uploading any TikTok content while dressed in uniform. He called it “total nonsense”, and said the police can do that in their civilian clothes. He also called upon the Professional Standards Unit to look into the matter urgently.

The banning took place on Friday the 27th during a Christmas Ball for the South-West Police Region. Despite the Commissioner’s visible disgust at police TikTokers, he congratulated them for serving the country well.

And to close this edition, some locals from Zomba city in the Southern Region took some huge stones to barricade Mpondabwino Bridge on Saturday the 28th. They were angry that the bridge, which was built between twenty twenty and twenty twenty-one and only started working in twenty twenty-two, had already developed huge cracks and potholes.

Nicholas Mwisama, the Chairperson for the Civil Society Organizations in Zomba, called for the closure of the bridge and demanded its reconstruction as it poses a danger to all its users. He also demanded that the authorities responsible for the construction be held accountable for the bridge’s condition.

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

Before leaving we want to wish you a happy and exciting twenty twenty-five! Thank you for sticking with us, sharing the podcast, and being such an amazing part of our community. We’ll be here as long as you’re enjoying the episodes, so if you have any thoughts, ideas, or suggestions for how we can get better, don’t hesitate to reach out—shoot us an email at info@rorshok.com. We’d love to hear from you!

Pitani bwino!