Mwenefumbo fights Mwalwanda: Malawi ruling PP civil war
Battle lines have been drawn in the ruling People’s Party (PP) up in the northern region the latest being the fight for parliamentary seat in Karonga central constituency where former legislature Frank Tumpale Mwenifumbo has managed to entice the party machinery to declare him candidate before primary elections.
A member of the 2014 Joyce Banda Presidential Campaign Committee and Mzimba Hora MP Reverend Christopher Ngwira said PP is geared to return Mwenifumbo in 2014 claiming he is the rightful owner of the constituency.
Mwenifumbo, then a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) senior official, trounced Dr Cornelious Mwalwanda in the fraudulent DPP primaries in the run up to the 2009 general polls.
Mwalwanda stood as an independent candidate and won resoundingly.
Both Mwalwanda – now deputy minister of finance- and Mwenifumbo are now senior PP members.
“Some people were just escorting and will remain as such,” Reverend Ngwira said as Chisowolo Primary School ground at Lupembe in Karonga District during the finals of the Mikoma Beach Football and Netball Trophies.
Mwenifumbo is proprietor of Mikoma Beach Lodge.
In his remarks, Ngwira said the fact that Mwalwanda boycotted the function on Sunday where senior PP officials like Treasurer General Harry Mkandawire and Mwenifumbo himself as Deputy Secretary General was an indication that the deputy minister was not a PP member.
However, Mwalwanda trashed Reverend Ngwira’s assertions as “nonsense and illogical”
“I am deputy finance Minister, MP for the constituency and PP’s deputy finance organizing secretary. Then how am I supposed to attend a function organized by a PP aspirant for the same constituency? Is that logical?” he queried.
Harry Mkandawire augmented Ngwira’s declaration further praising Mwenifumbo as “a heavy weight and my boss in the party” further claiming that is the reason President Banda “trust him very much”.
“I want to be a witness. I have all the hope that Mwenifumbo will sail through the primaries. If you make Mwenifumbo sail through at the primaries then as PP’s Treasurer general niti zenge na chithumba. Kweni phala munda chte iyvo chala nzengeko kuno chala,” Mkandawire said.
Mwenifumbo has since upped sponsorship to MK3.2 million saying he is obliged to plough back into the community the profits from his Mikoma Beach lodge.
“The electoral process has started and I did not want to leave people in suspense as to my position as regards running as an MP for this constituency. I do also recognize that I am evoking my constitutional right both as son of Karonga and as a Malawian,” Mwenifumbo told Nyasa Times in an interview.
Mwenefumbo is now regarded as strongman in the PP administration and now holds two critical positions in the party as northern region chairman as he is also in the national executive committee (NEC) as deputy secretary general.
He has been made to be the Acting provincial Governor (PC) for the Northern Region replacing the Reverend Brown Soko who has now been ‘warehoused’ at National Governing Council (NGC).
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