Don’t glorify thieves, says Chilima: Wonders what 80-year-old will do with stolen money

Malawian Vice President and UTM Party presidential candidate in the May 21 watershed elections, Saulos Chilima, has asked people in the country to stop clapping hands for thieves  ing government who plunder public resources.

Speaking during Imbizos in Dowa and Ntchisi Friday, Chilima said since he was born he has never heard of people clapping hands for thieves.

“Someone is 80 years old and is stealing government money, what is he going to do with that money at that age?” wondered Chilima in a thinly veiled reference to President Peter Mutharika, 79.

In a rally monitored by Nyasa Times on live video streaming,  Chilima, however, said he did not name anyone.

He said the presidency is not for one individual alone, saying the first president the late Kamuzu Banda left the presidency to Bakili Muluzi who also left it to the late Bingu wa Mutharika who again left it to Joyce Banda who left it to incumbent Peter Mutharika.

“This year  the incumebent (Peter Mutharika)  will hand over the presidency to me in a few days time, izi ndi zosiyilana izi,” said Chilima to the ululating crowd.

He also pledged a good Malawi under the UTM government insisting that ‘everything is possible’.

Chilima held 10 Imbizo tours in Dowa and Ntchisi on Friday and  told the gathering not to vote out of mercy or habit.

He will hold final mega rallies in Zomba on Sunday before going to the political mecca Njamba Freedom Park on Tuesday, Kamuzu Day before holding another rally in Mzuzu on Friday next week and a final rally at Likuni in Lilongwe on the last day of campaign, Saturday next week.

During the campaign period, which MEC officially launched on March 19, Chilima and Mutharika have on separate occasions accused each other of planning to rig the elections.

Mutharika also accused telecommunications companies TNM plc and Airtel Malawi of being complicit in the rigging, a claim both companies have dismissed.

Last week, the Immigration Department issued a memo addressed to all heads of sections in the country’s border posts to exercise caution in processing visa applications from risky countries of Nigeria, India and Russia.

Ironically, the memo followed Mutharika’s allegations at a campaign rally in Ntchisi that some of his challengers had engaged nationals of Nigeria, Greece and Russia in a purported scheme to rig the May 21 Tripartite Elections results using ICT.