Karonga Stadium workers detain MP Shaba: Nangaunozge contractor attacked for not paying salaries

Owner of the Nangaunozge building contractor who doubles as member of parliament for Mzimba central constituency, Henry Mpofu Shaba,  had a rufe awakening when he went to visit the construction site  of Karonga Stadium on Wednesday  when workers grabbed him by the neck for not paying them for three months.

The workers locked Shaba in the stadium while others started pinching him severely like a kid to force him pay them their three months’ salary.

“He has been not answering our calls neither did any official tried to assist us when we were knocking the door of their offices with this issue therefore we don’t want intervention because that will worsen things,” said Harison Kifungwe one of the leader for the workers.

Shaba who was afraid to inform the law enforcers said “my money is in Lilongwe, what is 5 million Kwacha to me, if you want choose three people amongst your group to go and collect it.”

When asked why he came without money, Shaba said “I came here to attend the meeting with other stakeholders on top of that I was at the funeral at home.”

This did not go well with the workers who started mocking him while shouting in a vernacular language takola tekha mwahuno, kufwa pala ndalama ulije ‘we have catch you ourselves and you will die today if you don’t have money’.

With the help of some reporters, the workers were convinced to let Shaba leave the place temporarily to borrow money from some of the business operators in the district.

They  however took away his car keys and he was forced to board a bicycle taxi to search for money from vendors in Karonga township, a distance of about 3 kilometres from the construction site, to pay the accumulated salary of over MK5,000,000.

He was rescued by  Karonga based businessman Mungasulwa Mwambande who gave him some “katapila” of  MK 3,000,000.

Mwambande demanded a collateral of 600 bags of cement meant for the construction and a 7 toner lorry which the contractor had no option but to release to his redeemer as confirmed by the Karonga police where the two went to put their pens on paper for an agreement.