2026, Dr Jane Ansah and the test of a nation

In January 2026, Malawi’s First Vice President, Dr Jane Ansah, opened a letter from the Office of the President and Cabinet. The Department of Disaster Management Affairs, DoDMA, was gone. On January 23, the Department of Public Sector Reforms followed. Both were moved to the OPC. The official reason given was “streamline decision-making and speed”. The political reality was different. Dr Ansah had just returned from a private trip to the United Kingdom, and her working relationship with President Arthur Peter Mutharika had soured. Overnight, the woman who once chaired the Malawi Electoral Commission and delivered the 2019–2020 election rerun was left with a title but no portfolio, a reduced security detail, and an office stripped of substance.

Dr Jane Ansah’s sidelining is worrisome, but the same scenario has been repeated long enough over the years for citizens of this country to learn, make sound judgment, and take strong action now and in 2030.

The second office, same pattern: Enoch Chihana grounded

The grounding of the Vice Presidency in 2026 is not limited to the first office. Second Vice President Enoch Chihana has also been sidelined. Since the start of the year, President Mutharika has bypassed both vice presidents, leaning instead on Cabinet ministers to execute state duties and represent government at national events. Mr Chihana was absent from key presidential departures and commemorations despite being in the country. Ministers presided over Martyr’s Day, Kamuzu Day, the tobacco season opening, and the Malawi International Trade Fair while the Second Vice President remained out of public view.

OPC officials insist this is about efficiency and cost-cutting, noting that Section 89(6) allows the President to delegate duties to ministers or designated officials. Governance experts and civil society leaders, however, warn that removing operational roles from both vice presidents creates the same institutional weakness seen before: offices with constitutional weight but no defined work. When the Second Vice President is excluded from national ceremonies and given no clear portfolios, the office becomes ceremonial at best and invisible at worst. Citizens end up funding positions that add no visible value to governance, while ministers absorb responsibilities the Constitution intended to be shared.

The lesson from Chihana’s sidelining mirrors Ansah’s. Malawi cannot afford two deputy presidents who exist only on paper. If the office is to mean anything, it must have defined duties, budget, and accountability. Otherwise, history will record 2026 as the year Malawi repeated its oldest mistake with both vice presidents at once.

This is where Malawi stands in 2026. Two Vice Presidents grounded. Ministers presiding over Martyr’s Day, Kamuzu Day, and the opening of the tobacco season. The President exercising Section 89(6) of the Constitution to delegate duties at will. The OPC insists there is “no tension”. Governance experts whisper “succession fear”. Citizens watch, weary.

But to understand 2026, we must run the film backwards. Malawi is not witnessing a new crisis. It is living the sixth verse of the same song that has played since 1994.

32 years of the vice president’s dilemma

Go back two years to June 10, 2024. A military aircraft carrying Vice President Saulos Chilima crashed in Chikangawa Forest. Nine people died. The nation mourned for 21 days. President Lazarus Chakwera eulogized Chilima as a “transformative leader”. Yet the tragedy closed a chapter of betrayal. Chilima entered office in June 2020 as Chakwera’s “reform VP”, chairing Public Sector Reforms and Economic Affairs. He spoke about anti-corruption, mega-farms, and civil service overhaul. By November 2022 he was arrested over Sattar corruption allegations, stripped of all cabinet duties, but kept as Vice President. By 2023 the Tonse Alliance had collapsed and UTM was preparing to contest 2025 separately. The man who helped Chakwera win 59 percent in 2020 died estranged from the presidency he served. The lesson is stark: even a VP with a clear mandate can be neutralized once succession fear sets in.

Rewind further to 2019–2020. Chilima began as President Peter Mutharika’s protégé. In 2014, at 41, he was chosen as a technocrat to give the Democratic Progressive Party reform credibility. By 2017 Mutharika removed him from key committees. Chilima declared he would not be a “flower girl”. In 2018 he resigned from the DPP, formed the United Transformation Movement, and ran against Mutharika in 2019. When the Constitutional Court nullified that election, Chilima abandoned his presidential bid and joined Chakwera in the Tonse Alliance. They won in 2020. Here lies Malawi’s paradox: a VP sidelined by Mutharika helped end Mutharika’s rule. An office weak by design became democracy’s safety valve.

Back to 2004. President Bingu wa Mutharika chose Dr Joyce Banda as VP for gender balance and donor appeal. In 2005 he left the United Democratic Front and formed the DPP. Banda refused to follow. She was expelled from cabinet, her security detail reduced, investigated, and faced impeachment moves. For eight years she served as “VP in name only”. Then on April 5, 2012, Bingu died. DPP officials tried to block Banda from succession, arguing she was “incapacitated” and no longer DPP. Army Commander General Henry Odillo backed the Constitution. On April 7, 2012, Joyce Banda was sworn in as Malawi’s fourth president and first female president. The Constitution saved Malawi because it protected the office, not the president’s preference. When politics failed, Section 83 worked.

Before Banda, Bingu’s Vice President was Cassim Chilumpha. Picked in 2004 as UDF Secretary General, he stayed with UDF when Bingu formed the DPP in 2005. He was stripped of duties and arrested in August 2006 on charges of treason and plotting to kill the president. He received bail in 2007, the trial dragged on, and the case eventually collapsed. He lost the 2009 running mate slot to Banda. A pattern emerged: VP stays in the old party, president forms a new party, VP is sidelined, then charges or impeachment follow.

Return to the start of multiparty democracy. In 1994 Bakili Muluzi chose Dr Justin Malewezi for technocratic credibility. They governed six years as “Baka-Jus”. In 2002 Muluzi pushed a Third Term Bill to extend his rule. Malewezi, the Vice President, said no publicly. He chose the Constitution over the president. Muluzi sidelined him, cut his budget, and excluded him from UDF meetings. Malewezi resigned in 2004, ran for president, and lost. Muluzi stepped down anyway because Parliament, donors, and citizens blocked him. The first VP-President conflict was about term limits. The VP lost his job, but the country kept its Constitution.

The main issues Malawians must learn from 1994 to 2026

The problem is not personalities, it is design. Section 83 makes the Vice President “president-in-waiting”. Section 89 gives the President all executive power and lets him delegate or withdraw duties at will. The VP is both essential and empty. By year two presidents see the VP as a next election threat. VPs become either silent or rebellious.

Citizens pay the price of every fallout. Chilumpha’s trial froze government business. Banda’s isolation preceded a donor freeze and cashgate. Chilima’s sidelining weakened reforms. When the top two offices clash, clinics run out of drugs, roads stall, and teachers are not recruited. Malawians must learn that VP drama is not elite gossip. It is their poverty.

Yet the vice president has also saved democracy. Malewezi helped block the third term bid. Chilima helped overturn a rigged election. A “troublesome VP” is often the only check inside government. If VP independence is killed to “keep peace”, the brake on presidential overreach is also lost.

Gender does not spare anyone. Joyce Banda faced impeachment and gendered attacks. Dr Ansah now faces the stripping of portfolios. Malawi’s culture often expects women in power to be grateful and quiet. When they assert authority, the system pushes back harder.

Hope is not a strategy. For 32 years Malawians hoped “this president and VP will be different”. Six pairs later, the pattern repeats. Leadership goodwill without rules always expires by year three.

What Malawians must do now, before 2030

Dr Ansah has five years to 2030. That is longer than any VP since 1994 had before tension began. It is also five years for citizens to act, not just watch.

Malawians must lobby Parliament between 2025 and 2027 for three amendments. First, define VP duties in law by locking four or five portfolios into the Constitution so no president can sideline the office through “no duties”. Make the VP chair of disaster response, public sector reform, anti-corruption oversight, and youth and jobs. Second, guarantee the VP a minimum budget line approved by Parliament, not the OPC. Third, clarify the party rule once and for all by settling whether a VP can leave the president’s party and remain in office. End the Chilumpha and Banda court battles.

Defending the Constitution means refusing to worship its gaps. A constitution that cannot learn from 32 years of pain is a decoration.

Every six months, citizens should ask three questions: What budget did VP Ansah receive? What committees does she chair? What decisions has she signed? Publish a “VP Scorecard”. When citizens monitor the office like they monitor the national budget, sidelining becomes politically expensive.

When conflict starts, elites will claim “Ansah is betraying the Lomwe or the DPP”. Malawians must refuse that framing. This is not about region. It is about power. A united citizenry demanding “fix the office, not fight the person” can break the cycle.

The President and VP cannot amend the Constitution alone. The 2029 parliamentary election must prioritize MPs who commit to VP-office reform. Vote for rules, not personalities.

Conclusion

From 1994 to 2026, Malawi’s Vice Presidency shows a repeated pattern. Section 83 designates the VP as successor, while Section 89 gives the President discretion to delegate or withdraw duties. This structural tension has produced six cases where VPs were sidelined, stripped of portfolios, or entered into open conflict with the President.

The 2026 situation involving Dr Jane Ansah and Enoch Chihana follows the same pattern. The offices retain constitutional significance but operate with undefined functions and no guaranteed budget. Historical outcomes vary: sidelined VPs have coincided with stalled governance and service delivery, while VPs who asserted constitutional roles have influenced elections and succession.

Whether this pattern continues will depend on how constitutional provisions on VP duties, resources, and accountability are interpreted and applied in future administrations.