Blantyre

Local economists have welcomed Monday’s decision by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to resume aid to Malawi, but warned government to keep its promise of fiscal discipline by cutting over-expenditure in non-priority areas such as foreign travel.

Malawi President Bakili Muluzi has defended his numerous overseas trips, saying they benefit the impoverished southern African country. Muluzi, who has just returned from a three-week trip to Asia, told a press conference that his critics were ”ignorant” and that he needed to travel in order to ”engage people”.

Alarmed by the dwindling numbers of a rare species of fish, locally known as chambo, the Malawi government has formulated a 10-year plan to restore the fish in Lake Malawi, and its largest outlet, Shire River. Lake Malawi is Africa’s third largest fresh water lake.

Malawi’s High Court has nullified a section of the country’s constitution that limits the freedom of association for lawmakers, describing it as an ”oppressive monster”. The clause in the constitution restricted lawmakers and politicians from participating in political groupings other than their own parties.

Up to half of Malawi’s professional workforce could die of HIV/Aids by 2005, the World Bank has said in a report timed to coincide with the opening of a major conference in Kenya on the pandemic in Africa. An estimated one million Malawians are living with HIV, out of a total population of 11-million.

Many Malawians stayed up late on Monday to watch the return of Big Brother Africa on the country’s only television station after the High Court quashed a ban imposed over the show’s sex scenes.

A Malawian journalist has been sacked from an Islamic radio station for broadcasting an interview with wives of five alleged al-Qaeda members deported last month from the southern African country under US orders, a radio official said on Thursday.

Amnesty International says it is increasingly concerned about America’s attitude to human rights in the wake of this week’s arrest of five suspected al-Qaeda operatives and their secret removal from Malawi.

Five suspected al-Qaeda members, whose extradtion had been blocked by the high court here, have now left Malawi for an undisclosed location, a government official said on Wednesday.

Malawi’s high court has barred the deportation of five foreigners suspected of belonging to the al-Qaeda terror network, their lawyer said on Monday.

Impoverished Malawi will have to wait till next month to hear whether millions in much needed aid will be made available, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) announced on Monday.

One man has been killed and several others injured in violent clashes between landless peasants and security guards at a tea estate in the southern Malawian district of Mulanje, police said on Thursday.

President Bakili Muluzi who earlier this week named his successor fired his entire cabinet on Wednesday, according to a statement from his office.

President Bakili Muluzi on Thursday became the first sitting Malawi president to appear before a court of law in the country’s 39 years as an independent state.

Foreigners have complained to the Malawi government about the controversial land policy which bars all non-Malawians and foreign firms from owning land, the land minister said on Tuesday.

Malawi’s government has barred demonstrations planned for Monday in protest against President Bakili Muluzi’s bid to stand for a third term in office, Justice Minister Henry Phoya said.

Cholera has killed 28 people in Malawi since the onset of rains in October last year, a health official told AFP Thursday. Habib Somanje, controller of preventive health services said the death toll from the infectious water-borne disease had risen by
nine in one month.

Floods and heavy rains caused by a tropical cyclone that hit Malawi last week have hampered relief food distribution in the famine-stricken south of the country, the World Food Programme (WFP) said on Thursday.

A group of lions that escaped from a national game park have killed three people in central Malawi, police said on Monday. Police say the lions crawled through a break in the fence at the Kasungu National Park.

Floods in Malawi have left four people dead and more than 15 000 people homeless while causing extensive damage to desperately-needed maize crops, relief officials said on Sunday.

Malawi’s President Bakili Muluzi has fired deputy transport and public works minister Jan Sonke, Muluzi’s office said on Tuesday, after Sonke wrote him a strongly worded letter opposing a bid for a third term in office.

The Malawi government has yet to repay seven-million dollars to the European Union after the funds, intended for the health budget, went missing last August.

Malawi tobacco authorities on Wednesday suspended all sales for the country’s top export crop, tobacco, after prices plummeted on Monday.