Human Rights Defenders Coalition (HRDC) has turned down the invitation by Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development Symon Vuwa Kaunda to discuss land-related issues saying all they want is the ministry to resolve the matter.
Civil society organisations (CSOs) under HRDC banner Tuesday gave government five days to reverse sale of school land, failing which the CSOs will lead Malawians to a wave of protests.
Timothy Mtambo and Gift Trapence
There have been revelations that Livimbo, Chimutu, New Shire, Chilambula and Magwero have been encroached on by developers in deals that are allegedly dubious.
Minister of Lands Symon Vuwa Kaunda invited HRDC to a roundtable saying he wanted the rights defenders to appreciate what the ministry is doing since the issues of sale of public land came out.
According to the letter of invitation Malawi News has seen, signed by Sosten Chinkonda, Ministry of Lands wants HRDC officials, Ministry of Education officials and the claimant of Livimbo School’s land to meet, go to the site and resolve the issues.
“We would like extend the invitation to you to witness the verification exercise of the boundaries when Surveyor General will be retracing the boundaries of the land for Livimbo School on Monday November 25, you may wish to note that the problem of encroachments on the land for public institutions is so huge and it is therefore my plea that we should work together to arrest the problem.” reads part of the letter.
However, in a separate interview, Vuwa Kaunda disclosed that his ministry has withdrawn documents relating to land in question for further scrutiny at the ministry.
According to the minister, this is to comply with HRDC’s demand.
HRDC press conference yesterday focused on the alleged sale of land in some public schools and push for the resignation of Malawi Electoral Commission Chairperson Justice Jane Ansah among others.
Mtambo warned people that are allegedly plotting to infiltrate and end the grouping that they will not succeed because God will not let it happen.
HRDC has meanwhile endorsed truck drivers’ strike scheduled for November 3 2019.
The coalition has also announced new wave of anti-Jane Ansah demonstrations on December 10.
HRDC has been organising nationwide demonstrations to push for Ansah’s resignation for allegedly mismanaging May 21 Tripartite Elections which Malawi Congress Party and UTM are challenging in court.
Police in Mchinji have arrested 12 students of Magawa Secondary School for vandalising school property during Tuesday night. According to Mchinji Police the arrests were part of police interventions to restore peace at the school.
Police Spokesman Kaitano Lubrino
Mchinji Police spokersperson, Kaitano Lubrino said the students vandalised school property in reaction to the school’s authority move to suspend a student who had a radio in the school against school rules. The irate students petrol bombed the administration block where the head teacher’s office has been the most affected.
Early last month, students from the school took to the streets and presented a petition to Mchinji District Education Manager, where they complained over poor learning conditions at the school.
Fifa President Gianni Infantino is expected to visit the country next week Wednesday to inspect the body’s Forward 2.0 project.
In a letter dated 14th November addressed to Nyamilandu a Fifa Council Member, Infantino said he was looking forward to meeting the members of Malawian football community and Government officials.
“It will be a unique opportunity to visit the various infrastructure projects carried out, to share our vision of football and the ways to further develop our game in your country and promote its values. I have no doubt this visit will strengthen our ties and enable us to continue working together to accomplish these objectives,” Infantino says in his later.
Confirming the development, Football Association of Malawi (Fam) chief executive officer Alfred Gunda told a local newspaper that Infantino’s visit to Malawi was part of his tour of Africa which will see him visiting other countries such as Namibia, Lesotho, Mozambique and Zimbabwe.
Nyamilandu and Infantino
He said Infantino will inspect Fifa funded projects and also officially open Mpira Village Stadium in Malalwi.
“This is a special visit because it will be his first time to be in Malawi. We are privileged that through his visit he will appreciate various football developments that have happened so far [in
Malawi] and also share future plans of Malawi football development,” he said.
This would be the second visit of a Fifa President to Malawi as the body’s former boss Sepp Blatter also visited Malawi in 2002.
Ministry of Gender, Children, Disability and Social Welfare has underscored the need for active political participation among young women. Director of Gender in the Ministry Mercy Safalao said this in Blantyre during a political empowerment campaign of young women in elections.
Safalao said government had realised the need to empower young women and has always committed to empower young women through various policies and programs.
“We have policies in place that are aimed at empowering young women to take an active role in politics. We want to ensure that the country achieves the 50-50- target in politics between men and women,” said Safalao.
Viwemi Chavula, who is team leader for 50-50- Campaign Management Agency said despite registering an increase in number of female members of Parlianment from 32 to 45 in 2019 and from 53 to 67 female councilors, the average number of young women in politics is below 10.
“Much as we registered an increase in number of female candidates winning on parliamentary and councilor seats in the may 21 tripartite elections, we are not satisfied with the numbers. You may wish to note that out of the women who won in may 21, only two are young women below 35 years,” said Chavula.
One of the youthful female politicians, Carol Mdala who is a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Ward Councilor for Chilaweni in Blantyre Rural East Constituency and also the chairperson for Blantyre District Council said Malawians mustchange their mindset towads women leaders in the country if the 50-50 goals are to be achived.
Mdala told MBC that the road to her success was not easy in the May 21 tripartite elections as she faced verbal insults just because she is young and female. She said if not for her confidence and courage to achieve her ambitions, she could have given up way back.
“The road to my success has been tough and challenging. I could hear my opponents despising with an intention to pull me down,” explained Mdala.
According to Mdala, there are many young women across the country who have the zeal to contribute to the country’s development through politics just like but face challenges such as lack of financial support, societal wrong perception towards young women, verbal and psychological torture.
The development prompted 50-50- Campaign Management Agency in collaboration with other stakeholders held a meeting in Blantyre to reflect on how young women performed in the may 21 elections.
The meeting brought together young women who won during the may 21 tripartite elections and those who did not make it to encourage them not to give up but rise and claim their destiny.
For the first time ever, a Malawian has been shortlisted for the Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation, run by the UK’s Royal Academy of Engineering, which recognizes ambitious African innovators who are developing scalable engineering solutions to local challenges.
The 16-strong shortlist was announced on Thursday in Cape Town, South Africa.
The Malawian, Catherine Chaima developed Cathel, an affordable antibacterial soap made from agricultural waste and and local ingredients using indigenous knowledge.
The daughter of farming parents, Chaima grew up in rural Malawi, where groundnuts, cassava, banana and rice are popular crops.
Cassava peels and groundnut shells, however, pile up around farms as they are not seen as powerful composting material. While banana leaves have many applications, the sheer volume of waste produced by this crop means mounds of dry leaves pile up.
As a chemical engineering student, Chaima focuses on re-purposing waste. During her final year, she turned her attention to the hidden properties of these agricultural by-products. When she discovered that the leaves, shells and peels her parents threw away could be used to produce potassium hydroxide, the idea of Cathel soaps was born.
Cathel soap – named after Catherine and her co-founder Ethel – also uses alternative anti-bacterial ingredients.
Several commercial soaps in Malawi rely on Triclosan, which not only kills harmful bacteria, but also bacteria required to maintain healthy skin. For Cathel, the pair relied on indigenous knowledge to identify natural ingredients such as Moringa, which has anti-bacterial properties as well.
Chaima hopes that the process she uses to make the soaps could establish an industry for agricultural waste to become a valuable commodity in Malawi.
“Cathel started out as a final-year chemical engineering project, but has turned into a product with so much potential to create extra income for farmers, harness indigenous ingredients, and provide Malawian families with affordable, hygienic soap,” she said
This year’s shortlist representing six countries includes the creators of a smart library on wheels, a low-cost digital microscope to speed up cervical cancer diagnosis, bamboo bicycles made from recycled parts, and two innovations made from invasive water hyacinth plants: an animal feed and a cooking fuel.
Launched by the Royal Academy of Engineering in 2014, the annual Africa Prize awards crucial commercialisation support to the innovators who are transforming their local communities. The Prize has a track record of identifying engineering entrepreneurs with significant potential, endorsing those who, with the support of the Prize, have gone on to achieve greater commercial success and social impact.
Alumni of the Prize are projected to impact over three million lives in the next five years and have already created over 1,500 jobs and raised more than $14 million in grants and equity.
A unique package of support will be provided to the shortlisted persons over the next eight months to help them accelerate their businesses.
The benefits of selection include comprehensive and tailored business training, bespoke mentoring, funding and access to the Academy’s network of high profile, experienced engineers and business experts in the UK and across Africa.
First Malawian shortlisted for African Engineering Innovation prize
For the first time ever, a Malawian has been shortlisted for the Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation, run by the UK’s Royal Academy of Engineering, which recognizes ambitious African innovators who are developing scalable engineering solutions to local challenges.
The 16-strong shortlist was announced on Thursday in Cape Town, South Africa.
Chaima: shortlisted for engineering award
The Malawian, Catherine Chaima developed Cathel, an affordable antibacterial soap made from agricultural waste and and local ingredients using indigenous knowledge.
The daughter of farming parents, Chaima grew up in rural Malawi, where groundnuts, cassava, banana and rice are popular crops.
Cassava peels and groundnut shells, however, pile up around farms as they are not seen as powerful composting material. While banana leaves have many applications, the sheer volume of waste produced by this crop means mounds of dry leaves pile up.
As a chemical engineering student, Chaima focuses on re-purposing waste. During her final year, she turned her attention to the hidden properties of these agricultural by-products. When she discovered that the leaves, shells and peels her parents threw away could be used to produce potassium hydroxide, the idea of Cathel soaps was born.
Cathel soap – named after Catherine and her co-founder Ethel – also uses alternative anti-bacterial ingredients.
Several commercial soaps in Malawi rely on Triclosan, which not only kills harmful bacteria, but also bacteria required to maintain healthy skin. For Cathel, the pair relied on indigenous knowledge to identify natural ingredients such as Moringa, which has anti-bacterial properties as well.
Chaima hopes that the process she uses to make the soaps could establish an industry for agricultural waste to become a valuable commodity in Malawi.
“Cathel started out as a final-year chemical engineering project, but has turned into a product with so much potential to create extra income for farmers, harness indigenous ingredients, and provide Malawian families with affordable, hygienic soap,” she said
This year’s shortlist representing six countries includes the creators of a smart library on wheels, a low-cost digital microscope to speed up cervical cancer diagnosis, bamboo bicycles made from recycled parts, and two innovations made from invasive water hyacinth plants: an animal feed and a cooking fuel.
Launched by the Royal Academy of Engineering in 2014, the annual Africa Prize awards crucial commercialisation support to the innovators who are transforming their local communities. The Prize has a track record of identifying engineering entrepreneurs with significant potential, endorsing those who, with the support of the Prize, have gone on to achieve greater commercial success and social impact.
Alumni of the Prize are projected to impact over three million lives in the next five years and have already created over 1,500 jobs and raised more than $14 million in grants and equity.
A unique package of support will be provided to the shortlisted persons over the next eight months to help them accelerate their businesses.
The benefits of selection include comprehensive and tailored business training, bespoke mentoring, funding and access to the Academy’s network of high profile, experienced engineers and business experts in the UK and across Africa.
Following this period of support, four finalists are selected and invited to pitch their improved innovation and business plan to the judges and a live audience. A winner is selected to receive £25,000, and three runners up receive £10,000.
“For six years we have been humbled to work with African entrepreneurs who use engineering to shift how we think about problems, developing disruptive technologies for everything from energy and agriculture to housing, transport and finance,” said Rebecca Enonchong, Africa Prize judge and Cameroonian entrepreneur.
“These are the local entrepreneurs who are transforming Africa, and we are once again honoured to guide and learn from the brightest minds chosen for the Africa Prize shortlist.”
Chaima
The 2020 shortlist includes innovations disrupting essential industries for economic development, such as energy and agriculture. They range from a containerised system that uses burning biomass to preserve crops, a quick and accurate probe to measure humidity in grains, a set of apps that help prevent food waste, a heat storage system that allows rural schools to cook food quickly and easily without firewood, facial recognition software to prevent financial fraud, and an anti-bacterial soap that makes use of discarded crop waste.
This year also features a number of innovations to improve energy access, such as a solar grid management system that helps users manage energy use remotely, and an off-grid power and refrigeration system gets small commercial operations in arid, rural regions operating on par with those in cities.
Recycling is also a theme, as the list also sees a water filtration process that uses waste like bones and coconut shells to provide safe drinking water without expensive equipment, and a set of digital and hardware tools to control the collection, sale and shredding of recyclable plastics.
The Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation, founded by the Royal Academy of Engineering, is Africa’s biggest prize dedicated to engineering innovation. It awards crucial commercialisation support to ambitious African innovators developing scalable engineering solutions to local challenges, demonstrating the importance of engineering as an enabler of improved quality of life and economic development.
