Malawi denies President Mutharika ill health: State House refutes foreign doctors flown in

State House has denied reports that President Peter Mutharika is ill and that foreign doctors have been flown in to treat him.

Social media rumours have been spreading that Malawi government has hired doctors from South Africa to treat the President who tripped last Saturday during a tree planting function at Kamuzu Palace in Lilongwe.

The information circulating indicates that government had flown doctors by private chartered jet spending K420 million for their services and that Mutharika is undergoing specialist treatment.

But Presidential spokesman Gerald Viola strongly dismissed the claims, labelling them load of rubbish.

“The President is fit and well and he is performing his normal routine,” Viola said on Daybreak Malawi program aired Monday on Capital Radio.

He said those speculation about the President’s ill health are sick and evil minds.

“Malawi government has not hired foreign doctors.  We have [competent] doctors in Malawi,” said Viola.

He described the reports as “propaganda on social media.”

Viola stressed that President Mutharika is energetic and alert and that reports suggesting he is poorly are “laughable.”

The Presidential spokesman maintained that Mutharika was “OK”.

Recently, Mutharika hired physician Hetherwick Ntaba as domestic advisor.

A long time Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) spin-doctor, Ntaba was also personal physician of founding President Dr Kamuzu Banda and later on hired by former president Bakili Muluzi to be a physician of his late mother.

He was also an aide of late president Bingu wa Mutharika.