UTM invokes memory of late Chilima after VP Ansah ‘shut out’ of Cabinet

The UTM Party has broken its silence over the reported exclusion of Vice President Jane Ansah from a Cabinet meeting held in Lilongwe, warning that what may look like a mere procedural oversight in fact exposes something far more troubling at the heart of government.

In a hard-hitting press statement made available to Nyasa Times, UTM president Dalitso Kabambe said the party understands the pain of such treatment better than most — invoking the painful memory of its late founder to drive the message home.

“Our late founder, Rt. Hon. Dr. Saulos Klaus Chilima, knew what it meant to serve at the highest level, only to face isolation, marginalisation, victimisation, and the shrinking of the very space in which he was elected to serve,” Kabambe said.

The reference to Chilima — who died in a plane crash in June 2024 while serving as Vice President — is a deeply emotive one for the UTM Party, and appears designed to draw a direct parallel between his own experiences in office and what Ansah is now said to be facing.

Kabambe went further, suggesting that Chilima’s own turbulent journey through the corridors of power had taught the nation a lesson that Malawians ignore at their peril.

“When leaders treat people as instruments of power, the whole nation suffers,” Kabambe warned, in a pointed remark that appears aimed squarely at the current administration’s handling of Ansah.

The statement is likely to reignite uncomfortable questions about the true extent of the Vice President’s influence and standing within Cabinet — questions that have simmered beneath the surface of Malawian politics for months.

Vice Presidents in Malawi have long occupied a delicate position within the political hierarchy — constitutionally significant, yet at times politically sidelined, depending on the dynamics between the President and their deputy.

The reported exclusion of Ansah from a Cabinet meeting will do little to dispel concerns that history may be repeating itself.

Neither State House nor the Office of the Vice President has yet issued a public response to the claims, and the exact circumstances surrounding Ansah’s reported absence from the meeting remain unclear.

It is not known whether the exclusion was a deliberate decision, an administrative oversight, or the result of a scheduling conflict.

Nevertheless, the UTM Party’s swift and sharply worded intervention signals that the opposition sees political opportunity in the episode — using it to draw attention to what it frames as a troubling pattern of marginalising senior leaders once they fall out of favour, or are perceived to hold rival ambitions.

Kabambe’s statement stopped short of directly accusing President Peter Mutharika’s administration of deliberately sidelining Ansah, but the underlying implication was hard to miss, particularly given the emotionally charged reference to Chilima’s own experience of being pushed to the political margins before his death.

The UTM Party has called for greater transparency around the circumstances of the Cabinet meeting, and it remains to be seen whether the matter will be addressed further in Parliament or through an official government statement in the coming days.

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