On Thursday, the party of Saulos Chilima, the vice president of Malawi who passed away in an aircraft crash this week, called for an inquiry.
When a military plane on an internal flight crashed into Malawi’s Chikangawa Forest on Monday in heavy fog, Chilima and eight other people perished.
In the 2020 presidential election, his party, the United Transformation Movement (UTM), fielded a combined ticket with President Lazarus Chakwera’s Malawi Congress Party (MCP).
However, the coalition that put the two in government is currently under strain as UTM officials want responses from government ministries about the mishap.
“We demand to know what happened to our leader. The plane had previously flown to Mzuzu under similar weather conditions,” said leading UTM figure Stevie Mikaya, a regional governor.
“Was it a mechanical fault? Did it run out of fuel? We need the truth.”
On Thursday, UTM members of parliament and party councillors sought to bar Minister of Defence Harry Mkandawire and Homeland Security Minister Ken Zikhale Ng’oma from attending Chilima’s funeral.
At the party’s headquarters in the capital, Lilongwe, Mikaya accused the ministers of negligence.
“It’s disheartening that the plane crashed at 10:00 am, yet no action was taken to rescue those involved. We believe timely efforts from the ministers could have saved lives,” he said.
MP Chrissie Kanyasho criticised the government’s search efforts for the wrecked plane, which was only found on Tuesday.
“When we learned about the crash around 2:00 pm, we mobilised to search Chikangawa Forest,” she said.
“We found only one military vehicle with nine soldiers searching the entire area, which was inadequate. The search for the vice president was handled as if they were looking for a lost goat.”
In his hometown hamlet in the Ntcheu district, Chilima, 51, who died together with eight others, including former first lady Shanil Dzimbiri, will be laid to rest on Monday.
Although one of the names on the passenger list did not board the flight, the initial reports stated that ten individuals had died on board.
The aircraft, a Malawi Army Air Wing Dornier 228-202K, vanished on Monday after being instructed to return to Lilongwe after it was unable to land in the northern city of Mzuzu due to inclement weather.
The crew had safely flown the aircraft just hours before the tragedy, according to President Chakwera, who stated on Tuesday that he had traveled on the same aircraft on similar flights in the past.
“And yet, despite the track record of the aircraft and the experience of the crew, something terrible went wrong with that aircraft… sending it crashing down,” he said.
