Parliament gets tough on DPP youth cadets for terror

Malawi Parliament on Monday unanimously agreed to take tough action against the ruling Democratic Progressive Party  (DPP) youth  cadets who on Friday beat up a journalist and blocked three legislators from entering the building when their terror within and outside Parliament punctuated President Peter Mutharika’s opening of the 2018/19 Budget Meeting in Lilongwe.

Speaker of the House Richard Msowoya condemned the ugly acts by the cadets at parliament building .

“Political parties should embrace intraparty democracy,” said Msowoya.

Leader of the  House Kondwani Nankhumwa also condemned as barbaric the acts of intimidation of the members of parliament.

He however did not identify them as DPP cadets.

“The investigating state agencies are now reviewing the CCTV footage,” he said.

Main opposition, the Malawi Congress Party  (MCP) President Lazaurus Chakwera was blunt,  asking the ruling party to tame  the marauding cadets.

Chairman of the Malawi Human Rights Consultative Committee Robert Mkwezalamba has since asked for the disbandment of the cadets wing in the DPP, saying it was a disgrace to the nation.

However, the DPP publist Francis Kasails  said the rigghts  group was political.

“

They are poisoned  by one of the political parties in the country. They should be apolitical,” said Kasails, a suggestion dismissed by Mkwezalamba.

Nyasa Times can reveal that DPP regional governor for the south Charles Mchacha hoodwinked Mutharika into sponsoring the cadets which ended in state embarrassment before diplomats.

The President’s televised State-of-the-Nation Address (Sona) was interrupted twice, as Speaker Richard Msowoya desperately attempted to bring order in the House. By then, scuffles had broken out between police  and DPP cadets inside the House as heckling between the opposition and government members of Parliament (MPs) spread to the gallery where the ruling party’s cadres were seated.

Earlier, at the start of the shameful events, Mulanje South MP Patricia Kaliati, who is the party’s national director of women, had to be rescued by police and parliamentary security officers as her own party’s supporters blocked her at the gates of Parliament and threatened to manhandle her.

She later explained that she was being accused of supporting the new movement within the DPP that wants Vice-President Saulos Chilima to replace Mutharika as the torch-bearer in the 2019 Tripartite Elections.