Sunseed Oil must pay for polluting Malawi environment: No hiding in political connections! 

In 2014, government, through the Department of Environmental Affairs, closed Sunseed Oil Company Limited in Lilongwe for endangering communities around it through careless disposal of factory waste.

I don’t know, over the years, if Sunseed cleaned up after the closure but what I know is that the company was opened and resumed its production.

Four days ago, government returned to Sunseed and closed the company, again, for the same reason they closed it six years ago.

Esteemed Malawians, what is really happening in this country? Is the problem with Sunseed or it is the problem of the regulators?

Let’s get down to the basics.

All we know, from the facts given, is that Sunseed has always been a culprit in this game of illegal dumping of wastes that pollutes communities.

If the company was closed in 2016, the assumption is that its eventual opening was after an assessment of compliance to all the laws they were breaking.

Listening to Sunseed managing director Shripad Dabholkar, you would shudder to swallow his make-believe surprise with the department’s decision, claiming the company complied with all requirements, including submitting a performance report and indicating how they were managing their effluent treatment plant.

However, the Department of Environmental Affairs visited the company and, right there, they followed the flow of the effluent from the outlet to the field which covers a distance of over one kilometer.

The department further said they have been engaging the company to improve, as such; they closed it for lack of improvement.

For all its flaws, a slight pat is deserved on the Department’s back for doing its job of disciplining rogue and wayward companies such as Sunseed who think they can do anything they want to accumulate millions at the expense of the country’s future generation.

We should not, however, not shy away from  discussion some of the issues why companies such as Sunseed always get away with their illegalities.

A few days after President Lazarus Chakwera’s inauguration, social media with amok with a picture of a Sunseed official Irshaad Mahomed shaking hands with the Head of State.

On his Linkedln account, Mahomed wrote: “Today is an amazing day in the history of Malawi. His Excellency The President of Malawi Dr Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera was sworn in as the 6th president of Malawi… I had the honour of meeting him in person at his residence today after the ceremony… He is truly a great man and a new Malawi has been born today. A new Malawi for all.”

Its tours such as these, especially what they said in closed cameras that strengthen the resolve of these guys to keep getting away with destroying our environment.

We can’t shy to stories about how these Indian-owned and run companies always palm oils politicians as a bit to get away with crime.

Not anymore, President Chakwera.

If we want to build Malawi ‘Wokomera Tonse’, we should ensure that no one is above is the law. We cannot go on watching the future of this country being destroyed by rogue companies that stagger around with false sense of invincibility.

Sunseed must face the full wrath of the law.

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