By Linda Kwanjana
More than two decades ago, an ambitious property development began taking shape on the northern outskirts of Lilongwe, along the road towards Lumbadzi and Kamuzu International Airport.
Eventually put forward as a US$600 million development covering roughly 500 hectares, Kanengo Northgate was supposed to be much more than a housing estate. The vision included executive homes, a business complex, shopping mall, schools, clinics, a hotel, industrial facilities, a golf course and other services.
Malawi’s investment documents described GM Properties Limited as holding approximately 450 hectares and presented the project as a way of easing Lilongwe’s housing pressure while creating new commercial and investment opportunities.
But fast-forward more than 20 years and the landscape tells a very different story.
There are no sprawling neighbourhoods, no bustling commercial centre and no new satellite city. Instead, large stretches of land remain largely undeveloped, punctuated by houses and maize fields.
Behind that emptiness lies a much more complicated story: financing difficulties, a disputed land acquisition, compensation claims, litigation and allegations involving businessmen and politically connected individuals. The paper trail stretches across leases, title documents, government correspondence, court proceedings and financing records.
The question is no longer simply what Northgate was supposed to become.
What went wrong?
THE ORIGINAL DREAM
When Kanengo Northgate was conceived around 2005, it was presented as an ambitious, Beverly Hills-style residential development of about 1,800 executive houses, together with a business complex, shopping mall, academy, clinic, golf course and other supporting facilities.
The vision later became even larger. Investment documents described an integrated residential and industrial development with a hotel, warehouses, industrial buildings, schools, clinics, banking and postal services, a police facility, service station, golf village, angling pond or dam and conservation areas.
The numbers were equally ambitious. Later documents placed the proposed investment at about US$600 million and identified the need for an equity or financial partner. Yet the same project profile described Northgate as “non-operational”, while earlier documents had already described it as stalled.
There was some institutional financing. South African based Shelter Afrique provided about US$1.2 million for a pilot project involving infrastructure for 102 plots and the construction of 40 three-bedroom houses. By June 2026, GMP’s lawyer, Jefferson Luwa, was quoted inn the media saying only nine houses had been taken up by buyers.
The gap between that modest pilot and the US$600 million vision is one of the first mysteries of Northgate.
THE MONEY — AND THEN THE LAND
Northgate’s first problem appears to have been money. The ambition was enormous, but the financing required to turn the plans into a new urban community proved difficult to secure.
Then came the land.
For the late businessman Gaude Maluza and GM Properties, the land was the foundation of the Northgate dream. For communities in Kuliyani, Mwambakanthu and Kwindanguwo, under Traditional Authority Chitukula, it was home.
The paper trail raises uncomfortable questions.
GM Properties obtained a 199-year lease over the land in 2005. Yet on 28 September 2006, the Chief Legal Aid Advocate wrote to the company advising it to compensate and resettle people affected by the project. Government had reportedly identified land in Salima for their relocation.
So how did a 199-year lease come into existence while compensation remained unresolved? What was the legal basis for granting it, who authorised it, and had the necessary conditions been satisfied?
The question did not disappear.
In 2023, former Lilongwe District Lands Officer James Mwenda told the High Court that the council had no record of receiving a compensation cheque from GMP. He said the normal process required the developer to provide the compensation money to the council before the affected people could be compensated and relocated.
That evidence makes the chronology difficult to ignore: lease first, compensation dispute afterwards — and, according to the council, no record of the compensation payment.
THE CHAUDHRY CONNECTION
This is where Azhar Mahmood Chaudhry enters the Northgate story.
In 2020, media reports said law-enforcement agencies were investigating Chaudhry and a senior government official over the alleged dubious acquisition of more than 100 hectares connected to the Northgate project. The reports placed Chaudhry directly in the controversy surrounding the land.
Other reporting went further. It alleged that Chaudhry had acquired the Northgate land fraudulently through GM Properties, portraying GMP as the corporate vehicle through which he obtained the land.
In 2021, the media reported that GMP was under pressure from an Asian origin investor to whom it had sold the land after presenting the controversial lease. That investor turned out to be Chaudhry, a Pakistan origin.
That distinction matters.
If Chaudhry did acquire an interest in the Northgate land, when did the transaction happen? What exactly changed hands? Was it a direct sale by GMP, an interest in another company, a financing arrangement or something else?
And, perhaps most importantly, what title or lease was used to effect the transaction?
Those questions become more significant because the land was already subject to unresolved compensation claims and questions over the circumstances in which GMP obtained its 199-year lease.
THE COURTS AND THE PEOPLE
The dispute eventually moved firmly into the courts.
In 2021, GMP obtained an order restraining residents from developing parts of the disputed land. The residents challenged the move, arguing that they had not been compensated. The High Court subsequently stopped attempts to remove them pending determination of the dispute.
On 8 November 2024, however, High Court Judge Howard Pemba ruled that land under Title Number Alimaunde 26/5 belonged to GM Properties. The ruling gave GMP judicial recognition of its title.
But ownership did not end the compensation question.
In 2026, GMP moved to enforce the court’s order and take possession. The media reported that residents of Kwindanguwo had been compensated, while some residents of Kuliyani had not. Those who remained uncompensated argued that they could not lawfully be removed before receiving what was due to them.
The Ministry of Lands subsequently announced an investigation into how GMP obtained legal ownership of the land, with officials acknowledging questions about whether the title had been issued in breach of the ministry’s own procedures.
That creates an extraordinary situation: the courts have recognised GMP’s title, while government is simultaneously examining how that title was obtained.
For the residents, meanwhile, this is not an abstract property dispute. It is about homes, farms and communities that say they have lived on the land for generations.
Traditional Authority Chitukula has demanded an investigation into how GMP obtained the title without, according to the available records, compensating affected residents. Former Lands Minister Kezzie Msukwa is also on record to have said that displacing people before compensation would be unprocedural. He added that government would not allow ‘crooks’ to grab land from poor people.
THE BIGGER PICTURE
There is growing concern among ordinary Malawians, particularly those struggling to secure land on which to build their own homes, over prime land that has remained tied up for many years while the promised development has largely failed to materialise.
The Northgate project was presented as a US$600 million investment. Yet, more than two decades later, that investment remains largely a pipe-dream. The original vision is yet to be delivered on anything close to the scale promised.
This raises a fundamental question about the terms under which such land was allocated in the first place.
There should have been clear conditions attached to a lease of this magnitude, including development milestones and provisions for revocation if those milestones were not met. Prime land of such magnitude cannot simply remain tied up indefinitely while the intended development fails to materialise.
Land cannot be treated as an asset to be held indefinitely without delivering the public or economic value for which it was allocated.
If the purpose for which the lease was issued has not been fulfilled, the Minister of Lands should move in to recover the land where the legal requirements for doing so are met. If such a mechanism does not adequately exist, then government should consider whether policy and legislative reforms are necessary to prevent valuable land from being locked up for decades without meaningful development.
The Northgate land should not simply disappear into years of litigation and administrative disputes while the wider public waits for answers.
A DEEPER INVESTIGATION
The Anti-Corruption Bureau, the Attorney General and the Director of Public Prosecutions should consider whether the circumstances surrounding the acquisition, allocation, financing and subsequent transactions involving the land warrant a comprehensive investigation rather than a cursory review.
The history of Northgate raises too many unanswered questions to be dismissed as an ordinary property dispute.
How was the 199-year lease obtained? What information was provided to public officers? Were all statutory procedures followed? Were affected communities properly compensated before the lease was granted? What representations were made about the proposed development? Who ultimately stood to benefit from the transactions involving the land?
If an investigation establishes that public officers were given false or misleading information, or that any person deliberately circumvented the law in acquiring or dealing with the land, the culprits should be arrested and tried in accordance with the law.
WHY THE 199-YEAR LEASE?
The 199-year lease is one of the most important questions in the entire Northgate story.
What was considered so exceptional about the proposed development that such a lengthy lease was granted? Was the project sufficiently specialised or economically significant to justify those terms?
And if the project was indeed considered sufficiently important to warrant such a long lease, how did the land remain largely undeveloped for so many years?
Those questions become even more important when considered alongside the subsequent disputes over compensation, ownership, financing and development.
THE CAUTION ON THE LAND
Another issue requiring examination is the caution reportedly placed on the land by members of the Chaudhry family.
What was the purpose of the caution?
Who lodged it, when was it lodged, on what legal basis and what transaction or interest was it intended to protect? Was it simply a legitimate legal measure to protect an existing interest for the Chaudhry family , or did it have another purpose?
THE CHAUDHRY TEST
Minister of Lands Chimwemwe Chipungu is on record as saying that he would not shield anyone found to be on the wrong side of the law, particularly in matters involving land. The Northgate controversy could therefore become an important test of that commitment.
The issue is whether the full chain of transactions involving the land can withstand proper scrutiny. What interest did Chaudhry or his associates acquire? When was it acquired? From whom? For how much? Under what agreement?
And what happened to the original development proposal after the transaction?Those are legitimate questions in a matter involving hundreds of hectares of prime land and a project once valued at hundreds of millions of US dollars.
WHERE DID THE MONEY GO?
Another part of the Northgate story that requires deeper examination is financing.
The project appears to have struggled to secure the enormous capital required to transform the original vision into reality. Various financing arrangements and potential partnerships were reportedly explored, yet the development never reached the scale originally envisaged.
This is where the financial paper trail becomes important. What financing was sought? Which institutions or investors were approached? What partnerships were proposed? What loans or facilities were obtained? What happened to the money that was actually raised? Were project funds kept in dedicated accounts? And, where funds were disbursed, what were they ultimately used for?
The fact that only nine houses appear to have been completed, while the wider project remained largely undeveloped, makes that financial trail particularly important.
Shelter Afrique’s involvement also raises questions. The institution provided funding for the pilot housing component, yet the project remained far short of its original ambition. The subsequent litigation surrounding the development adds another layer to an already complicated financial history.
WHAT SHOULD HAPPEN TO THE LAND?
The public-interest question is ultimately bigger than any one businessman or company.
If the original development has failed and the land can lawfully be recovered, government should examine what public-interest options are available under the law.
One possible approach would be to develop a transparent framework through which land recovered by government could be made available to Malawians for housing and other legitimate uses, subject to proper valuation, compensation where legally required, transparent allocation and clear development conditions.
Any such framework would also need enforceable timelines.
Those acquiring plots for housing, for example, could be required to develop them within specified periods, subject to reasonable exceptions. Similar conditions could apply to commercial or industrial allocations.
The objective would be to ensure that land is not simply transferred from one holder to another only to remain idle for another generation.
Prime land should generate housing, businesses, employment, infrastructure and economic activity.
A MATTER FOR PARLIAMENT
The Public Affairs Committee of Parliament should also consider examining the broader Northgate matter and, if it has the mandate and chooses to do so, undertake a comprehensive review of the public-interest issues surrounding the land.
Such an inquiry could examine the original allocation, the 199-year lease, compensation, government approvals, the project’s financing history, subsequent transactions, the current ownership position and the extent to which the original development obligations were fulfilled.
The objective should be a clear factual record.
If wrongdoing is established, the relevant institutions should take action in accordance with the law. If administrative failures are identified, those failures should be addressed. And if the existing legal framework is found to allow valuable land to remain dormant for decades without meaningful development, Parliament and government should consider whether the law needs strengthening.
THE NORTHGATE QUESTION
There is a temptation to conclude that the people behind Northgate simply did not have the resources to deliver the ambitious project they proposed.
That possibility needs to be tested against the documentary record.
Were they genuinely seeking the financing required for the project? Which institutions were approached? Which partnerships failed? What commitments were made? What money was received? What was spent? And what happened to the project after those financing efforts stalled?
At present, the Northgate story contains too many complications and qualifies to be treated as a failed property development project.
A project announced at a value of about US$600 million has produced only a fraction of the development originally promised. The land has been the subject of compensation disputes, court proceedings, financing arrangements and questions surrounding its original acquisition and subsequent dealings.
Meanwhile, ordinary Malawians continue to face difficulty accessing land for housing.
That is why Northgate matters.
Government may not be a party to every private dispute arising from the project. But government has a legitimate public-interest responsibility to ensure that land allocated under the country’s laws is acquired lawfully, used for its intended purpose and administered in a manner that serves the broader public interest.
Malawians deserve to know what happened.
And this reporter is still digging.
More information continues to emerge, and the Northgate story remains a developing investigation.
RIGHT OF REPLY
FocusMalawi contacted Azhar Mahmood Chaudhry and sought his response to the issues raised in this investigation, including the reported acquisition of an interest in the Kanengo Northgate land, the circumstances surrounding the transaction, the development of the project and the various allegations and questions contained in this report.
At the time of publication, Chaudhry had not responded to our request for comment.
We also sought comment from his lawyer on the Northgate matter, Alinane Kauka. He was not available for comment by the time of publication. Should a substantive response be received, FocusMalawi will give it due consideration and, where appropriate, publish it.
GM Properties Limited and other parties referred to in this report are similarly entitled to respond to any factual matters concerning them.
