Malawi mobilize military to mop city streets

Malawi

Lilongwe – Malawi’s poverty war Thursday took a fateful pivot and became a sideshow, when armed military rolled from Kamuzu Barracks into Lilongwe city’s central business centre to unleash their persuasive power against street traders, who were fighting police following an ‘ambush’ to remove them from the streets in a campaign to clean the city roads and eliminate criminal apparatuses. A wave of violent strikes by a joint operation by the Lilongwe City Council and police in the morning was enough to ignite latent economic frustrations and ratchet up strong resolve in the traders whose wares were thrown up and around in the disorder to raise up against the security forces and start rioting. The fierce resistance that ensued into running battles with the police boiled into anger and prompted the traders to spill over their frustrations against shops belonging Indian and Chinese nationals nestled along the streets. Lilongwe City Council public relations officer Tamala Chafunya said the council and police were merely conducting their normal and routine sweep in the streets to chase the vendors to designated trading areas.

But chairman of the street traders, Steven Malunga, said the duo provoked the situation as they did not engage the traders in any discussions to move out of the streets to areas designated for street vending. “They let the vendors trade on the streets all this time only to come up with a surprise attack that has led to loss of commodities some of which have been acquired through loans and expected to throw us just like that,” he said adding “that at least they should have had the courtesy to engage them in dialogue before violently attacking them”. Street vendors crept back into the streets from their designated areas after the July 20 demonstrations following a feast with president Bingu wa Mutharika where the head of state allegedly pledged his support to the vendor’s activities in exchange with their political support against civil society agitations. But as the situation got ugly and the police looked powerless in the Thursday stand-off, the military hit the ground and weathered the storm leaving the town centre out of business and deserted. At least 18 people are reported to have been arrested in the fracas. In Malawi’s poverty war, president Mutharika has on a number of occasions hinted on self employment as a catalyst for youth employment and national development.

He introduced the Youth Enterprise Development Fund (Yedef) to spur the youth into different business activities including street vending. Street traders form a substantial per centage of the country’s economically active population. The informal sector, to which the vendors belong, also forms the largest number of self-employed Malawians than the formal sector. However, for years government has increased liberalized trade with policies that have only benefited big companies in the private sector and left the informal industry without adequate breathing space. Big corporations receive tax breaks while vendors encounter zoning and licensing restrictions leaving them frustrated and in despair. According to Mathias Kafunda, programme officer for the Centre for Social Concern, in the course of the country’s economic meltdown, it must be noted that the population at the bottom of the ladder rung may not understand who is responsible for the scarcity of fuel, forex shortages and escalating cost of living, however, they understand that someone is using them as a cannon fodder to drive them to the gutters.

© 2012, Charles Mkula. All rights reserved.