Items filtered by date: May 2025

By Manasse Nyirenda

Rumphi, July 21, Mana: Councilor for Chinyolo/Mphompha Ward has been elected as new council chairperson for Rumphi District Council replacing councilor for Chitimba/Mchenga Ward, Gilbert Kasambara after leading the council for one year.

Munyembe beat Councilor for Nkhamanga Ward Alfred Butao by eight votes to three during a full council meeting held on Friday.

Munyembe has urged various sectors of the council to work together in order to achieve a common goal to improve the welfare of the people of Rumphi.

He also chaired the council from 2020 to 2021.

He will be deputies by councilor for Tcharo Ward, Starch Galatiya Kondowe.

Former chairperson, Gilbert Kasambara urged the new leadership to focus on development for the benefit of people of Rumphi.

By Memory Chatonda

BLANTYRE, July 21, Mana: Blantyre district council through the agriculture sector has launched a district-based catchment conservation management project to address land degradation problems and climate change impacts

 Launching the project on Thursday at Mkajdi sub-catchment in Kunthembwe EPA in Blantyre, District Commissioner Alex Mdooko described the project as essential for stimulating interest and mobilising communities for action in the implementation of climate-smart agriculture practices and other integrated catchment management.

"This project which falls under the World Bank-funded Malawi Watershed Services Improvement Project (MWASIP) is the continuation of the Shire River basin project that was implemented in this area some years ago to curtail the production of charcoal which was hugely practiced by some communities.

"This is why today we are launching this catchment conservation to encourage communities to participate in conservation management work to restore the environment and very soon, such participating members will be provided with matching grants to venture into non-charcoal businesses to support their livelihoods," he said.

He then encouraged communities to participate in the catchment conservation in large numbers and also take ownership of the project to ensure that there is sustainability.

In her remarks, Chief Agriculture Officer for Blantyre District Mphatso Kafuwa said in the project, participants will be involved in the management of village forest areas, and also land resource management activities such as the construction of swales, and tree planting exercises among others.

One of the beneficiaries Eneless Lungu of Mkajdi catchment hailed the project, encouraging other communities to participate in its implementation.

Lungu who is also the chairperson of the Mkajdi Catchment Management Committee attested: "From the time we started implementing catchment conservation and other climate-smart agriculture in this place, our crop yields have been doubled sometimes tripled in each passing year and we have also managed to engage in livestock production.

“...and today we are more than happy that as the launch of the project means our lives will continue to be transformed for the better both socially and economically.”

The catchment management launch was held under the theme ‘integrated catchment management for improved food security and climate resilience.

By Chisomo Kambanganda

Nkhata Bay, July 21, Mana: Nkhata Bay District Commissioner (DC), Rogers Newa says the council is geared to continue with implementation of various interventions on nutrition to improve nutritional statuses of people and reduce cases of malnutrition in the district. 

Newa was speaking on Thursday during a reward ceremony where the council was named as top winner in the Catholic Relief Service (CRS)’s Performance Based Incentives (PBI), a model through which various groups or individuals are being rewarded for star performance in nutrition related activities under AFIKEPO project.   

He said the council will prioritise improving on areas where it scored low and continue to foster coordination amongst nutrition structures.

Newa said: “We are extremely happy to be the top winning council in the competition. We are going to continue encouraging coordination among stakeholder ranging from the community to district structures. I urge everyone involved to continue working as a team for more success and development of the district.”

CRS Country Representative to Malawi, Sekai Mudonhi said as government’s partner in development they decided to implement PBI under AFIKEPO programme as a sustainability strategy.

“CRS is determined to improve people’s nutrition status mainly pregnant and lactating mothers and reduce cases of malnutrition in children. As such the PBI model is intended to promote nutrition related activities and practices within the AFIKEPO project’s catchment area,” she said.

Nkhata Bay District Council was presented with a K60 million cheque for scooping the top position while Karonga District Council which emerged runners up, went away with K40 million cheque. Traditional Authority (T/A) Kabunduli, group village heads, care groups and various households in the district were also recognized for their sterling performances and went home with various prizes. 

Afikepo Performance Based Incentive is being implemented by the CRS in 11 district councils under the AFIKEPO programme in partnership with UNICEF, FAO, Government of Malawi and University of Malawi with support from European Union.

By Chisomo Kambandanga

Nkhata Bay, July 21, Mana: People of Nkhata Bay have hailed government for its commitment in improving secondary school education in rural areas by constructing modern secondary school structures.

The sentiments were made Friday by Councillor for Chikwina Ward, Malani Kafunda following the commencement of construction works of Bula and Makumbo secondary schools in the district.

The two schools are among several secondary school the Ministry of Education is constructing across the country under Secondary Education Expansion Development (SEED) Project.

Kafunda said people in the district are excited that the project will bail out communities who have been trying so hard in the past to have the secondary schools in their areas but all efforts proved futile.

“We will make sure that these facilities are well taken care of. This will reduce school dropout especially among girls. We will mobilise resources for additional teachers’ houses and girl’s hostels to complement this good initiative,” Kafunda said.

District Commissioner for Nkhata Bay, Rogers Newa, said that there is good progress of construction works of the two schools.

“We will have three modern schools in Nkhata Bay under SEED Project. Two of them are already under construction,” Newa said

 He added that the construction of the schools is an indication that government is committed to promoting access to secondary school education.

A standard package of the secondary schools will include a science laboratory, an administration block and two teacher’s houses.

Public relations Officer in the Ministry of Education, Mphatso Nkuonera said the ministry is grateful to Government of United States of America for supporting construction of the schools they will help the Malawi Government to meet enabler number five which is Human Capital Development of the MW2063.

“We therefore appeal to other development partners to join hands with the ministry in developing the education sector. Nkuonera said.

Bula and Makumbo secondary schools are expected to be ready for use by December 2023.

By Joel Chirwa

Mzuzu, July 21, Mana: The Church and Society of Livingstonia Synod has appealed to government to convene an indaba with families of demonstrators who were killed by police on 20 July 2012 during anti- government demonstrations.

Speaking on Thursday at Zolozolo Cemetery during commemoration prayers for 11 people who were killed during anti-government protests in Mzuzu, Reverend Chipasi Chirwa said the dialogue could facilitate attainment of national reconciliation and healing.

He said the church has spearheaded the initiative of holding annual gatherings to remember the victims and remind the country on the importance of national unity and ensuring that such tragic event should not occur again.

“For the nation to move on there will be need for government to initiate measures that will pave a way towards national reconciliation and healing through dialogue with the bereaved families. There will be need for those in wrong to acknowledge that things went wrong.

“The acknowledgement should also be in form of assisting the families of the victims especially widows and children who are financially struggling following the loss of their breadwinners. Government should ensure that all school going children of the deceased should be put on bursary scheme,” he explained.

In interview with reporters, representative of the bereaved families, Mercy Mbesuma said the compensation they got when they took legal action against the state did not assist much as most of the funds went towards settling legal costs.

“Currently, most of the widows and children of the deceased are struggling to make ends meet. We would like the government to assist the widows with soft loans to start various business ventures and put their children on bursary scheme,” she said.

During the event it was learnt that most of the promises made by government authorities in previous commemorative events like fencing the deceased’s burial places and putting their children on bursary scheme have not been fulfilled.

In response to the concerns raised, Director of National Unity and Peace in the Ministry of Local Government Unity and Culture, Gerald Chigona who represented the Minister, Richard Chimwendo Banda promised to follow up on the said promises.

“On our side we will follow up on those promises. We will write a report and present it to relevant officials who will give us necessary guidance on how we can tackle the concerns raised,” he said. 

By Shaffie Bakali

Mangochi, July 20, Mana: Minister of Gender, Community Development and Social Welfare, Jean Sendeza on Wednesday encouraged men to work collaboratively with their wives as a way of ensuring good welfare and healthy growth for children in their respective homes.

The Minister said this at Chiwaula village, in the area of Senior Chief Katuli in Mangochi district during the official handover ceremony of Chiwaula Community Based Child Centre (CBCC), one of the CBCCs in the district constructed with funding from the World Bank, through the Investing in Early Years Project (IEYP).

She said good welfare of children includes sending them to CBCC, hence opening of the place.

Sendeza encouraged parents to be on forefront ensuring that the place is protected for the benefit of all children in the area.

The minister called on the community members to engage in a strong fight towards ending early marriages, child labour and discrimination of special groups of people such as elderly, handicapped and people with albinism.

"The ministry has launched National Men Engagement Strategy aimed at including our men to take part in all works deemed female dominated and also take a leading role against issues such as Gender Based Violence’s and Sexual Harassment" she said.

Member of Parliament for Mangochi East, Francesca Masamba commended the ministry for its support towards early childhood development, saying this is the only way to go in as far as education is concerned.

She said the newly constructed CBCC in her area will act as a motivation for more children to attend early childhood education.

Chairperson for Mangochi District Council Ivy Sande expressed gratitude to the ministry of gender for uplifting education in Mangochi through infrastructure development.

So far 15 CBCCs have been constructed in Mangochi under the 5 year IEYP which is coming to an end this year.

By Chilungamo Missi

Blantyre, July 20, MANA: Chiradzulu District Integrated Disease Surveillance and Response (IDSR) Focal Person, James Lisausyo has commended Evidence Action Organisation for its interventions that ensure that communities have access to safe water in the district.

Lisausyo made the remarks on Thursday in Chikankheni Village, Traditional Authority (T/A) Mpama in the district, during Evidence Action field visit aimed to appreciate the Chlorine Dispensers which the organisation installed in the district.

He said that with the intervention he expects a decrease in waterborne diseases saying the only way to deal with such diseases is water and food hygiene.

“We are coming from a period where the country experienced Cholera outbreak and Chiradzulu was not spared.

“The development is commendable as currently the country is dealing with Polio which spreads as a result of ingesting unhygienic food and drinking unsafe water, so Chlorine dispensers are ideal in the fight against the disease,” said the IDSR.

Speaking on the same, Village Headman Chikankheni said that his village welcomed the development which has assisted in curbing waterborne diseases since the chlorine dispensers were installed in his village three months ago.

“My village has 166 families, and we only have two water boreholes, a situation which forces us to drink from nearby wells. In the past, these wells were unprotected but now Chlorine dispensers have been installed in these wells and majority of the people have embraced them,” he said.

In her remarks, Evidence Action Associate Area Coordinator for Blantyre and Chiradzulu districts, Annie Laisani said that the organisation has installed 1,435 Chlorine dispensers in Chiradzulu district adding that they have so far installed dispensers in eight districts; Mwanza, Neno, Blantyre, Zomba, Balaka, Mangochi and Machinga.

She added: “Evidence Action came in to support government in curbing waterborne diseases and the programme is making positive strides although in some areas people are spreading myths concerning the dispensers, but with help from health workers we are addressing such problems by making sure that people have the right information.”

Innocent Chunga

Nkhota-kota, July 20, MANA. The Wildlife and Environmental Society of Malawi WESM, has vowed to strengthen its effort towards the restoration of bird population in areas around Chia Lagoon in Nkhotakota district.

Speaking on Wednesday at the launch of a 312 million Kwacha Chia Lagoon Waterbird project in the district, WESM Programs Manager Blessings Chingagwe, said the organization will assist communities in protecting birds, after noticing that Chia Lagoon is not gazetted as a protected area.

"The project will work with communities to better manage and restore the vital lagoon ecosystem, reverse decline in vulnerable and declining bird species and improve livelihoods in the communities." She said.

Nkhotakota District Environmental Officer, Jane Kayira encouraged WESM to work together with other organizations that are already on the ground with related projects at the lagoon to use already existing structures for smooth implementation of the project.

She said use of already existing community structures ensures project sustainability because other partners like Ripple Africa are implementing a similar fish for tomorrow project in the area which is looking at the ecosystem around the lagoon.

WESM has been dedicated to protecting Malawi's remarkable biodiversity and ecosystems for over 75 years. With support from UK based organization Dawn initiative, the project will work with nine villages from the areas of Senior Chief Mwadzama and Traditional Authority Kalimanjira and Nkhanga in the district.

WESM will work with partners in the project including Ministry of Natural Resources and Climate Change through Department of Fisheries, Environmental Affairs, Ministry of Tourism through Department of National Parks and Wildlife, Malawi University of Science and Technology (MUST), Micro loan Foundation, African Parks and Ripple Africa.

By Yamikani Yapuwa

Blantyre, July 20, Mana: Tamandani Chikuni from Jiya village, Traditional Authority Ntholowa in Zomba is a happy mother of three who successfully managed to get all her children vaccinated during the polio vaccination campaign at a go.

Chikuni said she does not take for granted the fact that she took her children to Magomero Health Centre on the day the campaign started and found the vaccine readily available because the facility used to experience erratic supply of vaccine in all the previous campaigns.

“We live very far from the District Hospital and other surrounding health centres. I remember visiting our health centre only to be told that there are no vaccines even for routine immunizations.

“In those cases, I would just go back home for it is hard for me to travel to the District hospital or the other health centers because of distance. We live in a rural set up where many parents and guardians cannot afford transport fare to Zomba District Hospital,” narrated Chikuni.

Another parent, Lucy Phiri added that there were instances her child was due to receive the routine immunizations only to find none at the health centre resulting into given future dates for her to come and check if they will have vaccines in stock.

“That used to put our children at risk as we wait for the dates and in some cases one would go on the given date only to find that the vaccine has finished,” explains Phiri.

Corroborating Chikuni and Phiri’s words, Wyson Matiki, Disease Control Assistance at the facility attested that it has indeed always been hard for Magomero to access drugs for the campaigns and routine immunization because of its topography and distance from the District Health Office.

“We have very bad roads here and the condition worsened after Cyclone Freddy making it hard for vehicles from the District to come and deliver vaccines at our facility in time.

“We also normally have issues with shortage of transport from there end. There are times that the vehicle is engaged somewhere or there is no fuel at the district.  This suffocated delivery of important supplies like vaccines during campaigns as well as routine immunizations,” said Matiki.

However, the case was different during the recent polio campaign as drones were used to deliver Polio vaccine to health centres resulting into constant supply of the vaccine during the entire campaign, thanks to United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef).

Unicef adopted the innovation of Drone Driven Vaccine Campaign which saw drones delivering vaccines to health facilities that are in hard to reach areas in Zomba, Mangochi and Chikwawa Districts.

The child-centered UN agency engaged Swoop Aero to do the job thereby ensuring fast, safe and effective delivery of vaccines to facilities like Magomero and Chisi Island in Zomba as well as Makanjira in Mangochi just to mention  a few using drones.

Cold Chain and Vaccine Management Consultant for UNICEF Simon Kondowe said this made it possible for every eligible child in the hard to reach areas to have access.

“We wanted to ensure that when the child comes to the facility for vaccines, they get it right away because it is always available at that facility.

“With the approach, we did not have issues like vaccine stock outs because the drones were able to respond in time hence having consistence supply of vaccine,” said Kondowe.

On top of that, Matiki also indicated that the drones eased the transportation problem which resulted receiving vaccines and commodities in time for the Polio campaign and routine works.

“In the past campaigns, we could stay the whole day during the campaign period without administering vaccines to children as we waited for a vehicle to do the delivery.

“But the drones made our job easy. We were serving the children as they come because the vaccines were delivered on time making it available all the time.

 “We had never gone a day without vaccines and we are optimistic that we will reach out to all the over 16,000 children in our catchment area by the end of the campaign since there is always constant supply,” explains the excitedly Matiki.

Operations Manager for Swoop Aero Malawi, Anne Nderitu noted that it had a good experience delivering vaccines in time and making an impact in the immunization campaign.

“We were able to deliver vaccines in three districts for this polio campaign as of Wednesday, 12 July, we had delivered 8500 doses in hard to reach health facilities in Zomba, Chikwawa and Mangochi.

“We had our drone operators based at the district hospitals who received vaccines from the Expanded Programme on Immunisation coordinators and package the vaccines in the drone.

“We put ice packs and cold chain. We package properly so that right conditions are maintained, we also have the temperature logger to track the temperature as the flight is ongoing,” said Nderitu.

She added that at the health facilities, health workers were trained to receive the drone, take out the cargo and the drone flies back to the district hospital.

On the timeliness of drones to deliver the vaccines, Bernard Ndawala, Drone Operator at Swoop Aero felt that time factor is critical especially in health care and drones are the fastest option.

“With a drone, a journey is cut short. We have been able to deliver polio vaccines to health centres which are three and half hours away from the District Hospital within 25 minutes or less.

“We have Chisi Island and for one to reach there, you need to go by road, then take a boat to the island and finally cycle to the health facility which is a long process.

“Using a drone, in less than 20 minutes, we were able to deliver vaccines therefore saving lives of children who could have been denied access if traditional transportation was used,” stated Ndawala.

He also cited another example of how they have been able to deliver vaccines to Makanjira in Mangochi within 45 minutes when initially the journey takes close to six hours when using an ambulance due to damaged roads and bridges.

Kondowe affirmed that Unicef is committed to ensuring that immunization process in the country is up to standard and supply chain system is one of  the areas that needs to be strengthened to make sure that facilities have enough vaccine at all times.

“So we are going to continue using drone delivery for future campaigns so long as we still have issues of accessibility in hard to reach areas,” he said.

He added that Unicef aims at expanding its reach to some facilities whom they have not been able to reach out to all in a bid to promote accessibility at all times.