SALIMA (Maravi Post)—Maravi Post has established that some country’s senior Chiefs are pocketing huge sums of money in dubious transactions by allowing investors and politicians to acquire land without formally consulting their subjects. However, this development has faced strong resistance from the affected families ending up into chieftaincy wrangles, fights, displacement, demonstrations, petitions, court injunctions and deaths.
This perhaps is the reason why Chiefs protested against the passing of the 2013 Land bill into law arguing that the legislation aims at dealing away with Chiefs in administering land as is the case in Tanzania.
The District Commissioners (DCs), so Maravi Post, has also established, are also on the forefront
conniving with Chiefs in land grabbing by taking advantage of the incomplete land legislation especially customary land whose weakness has victimized women, children and widows failure to access land
resources.
The past week’s media tour which Landnet Malawi organized with financial support from International Land Coalition (ILC) in some districts including Salima, Mzimba and Chikwawa revealed rampant cases of land grabbing rampant rendering women and children landless.
The media tour aimed at exposing terrible experiences of the marginalized group in the society (women and children) are going through due to weak land laws in Malawi.
For instance, a visit to Group Village Headman (GVH) Saidi, Traditional Authority (T.A) Bibikulunda in the central district of Salima exposed illogical attempt by the senior chief to displace poor families when she made shabby land deals with Malawi Mangoes Limited to acquire land of about 1,700 of 3,300 hectors of land and eventually Bibilukunda pocketed MK 212.3 million.
According to concerned citizen group for the area, the senior chief blackmailed village headmen with little shares from the big chunk she got from the deal. But the situation got worse when some affected
families were receiving MK500 each from the land sell proceeds which fueled the community’s anger.
Eventually, the affected households mobilized themselves by mounting vigils for 18 days at Salima DC offices in demand of the Chief Bibikulunda’s removal from the chieftaincy over her corrupt practices.
It had to take Malawi President Peter Mutharika intervention to suspend the chief from her chieftaincy pending investigations on the alleged corrupt practices she is embroidered in.
“We are happy that this corrupt chief has been suspended as she made us slaves on our own land. This land was sold dubiously to foreigners without consultations but only telling us that it was government which allocated it to green belt initiative which wasn’t the case.
“We are not against development projects on our land but openness on any land transaction. We want to benefit from its proceeds as the owners. This is why stood firm to our 18 days vigil at DC’s offices in
protesting the chiefs corrupt tendencies which we endured for so long time.
“Therefore, we are appealing to lawmakers in the ongoing the nation budget sitting of Parliament to prioritize discussion of the land bill that they pass it into law in a bid to address this tendency of land grabbing which we continue to experience. We need this law to protect our land which the only sources of income as we grow various crops, rearing domestic animals,” said Muhammad Chingomanje, Concerned Citizen grouping’s Publicity Secretary at T.A. Bibikulunda.
Similar scenarios of chiefs’ land grabbing tendencies are happening at Traditional Authority (T.A) Mgabu in the lower-shire district of Chikwawa where communities were forced to vacate their substance
farming into sugarcane farming which ended up the affected families divided over the the decision.
Currently, tension is still high in the area as two faction imaged (pro sugarcane farming or against sugarcane farming) which Tchalo Small holder Cane Glowers Association is advocating and venturing into for about 19, 600 square meters (140 m x 140 m)of land without communities consultation as over 140 households will affected.
“Our senior chief just came here telling us that the piece of land where we feed live-stocks will be used for sugarcane farming that whoever is affected by his decision should either venture into sugarcane or vacate the the land. We feel his decision wasn’t proper as we have been left in dilemma as to what course should we take on these two proposals.
“We feel that abandoning the usual subsistence farming will bring in food shortages to our families similar to what has happened to our friends in other areas. Sugarcane cultivation won’t bring much needed
food as it requires large pieces of land where many plots are added together while this small piece of land am having enables my family to have food throughout the year. We will not accept this decision”, challenged Sakina Isa, one of the affected families in the Group Village Headman (GVH) Nkhwanzi of T.A Mgabu.
It is against such a background that Landnet Malawi is advocating for the quick passing of the land bill into law for protection of innocent lives from land grabbing by urging Members of Parliament (MPs) to do
the needful job.
“What is coming clearly from various communities where land grabbing is rampant shows that absence and weak laws are contributing to the situation where some greedy chiefs together with land officials are taking advantages of loop holes in law by conniving with investors and politicians to acquire land without proper consultations. Therefore, the passing of this Land Bill into the law will bring sanity as it has all clauses in addressing some of these challenges communities are facing,” noted Joseph Gausi, Landnet Malawi’s Program Officer.
Malawi cabinet gazetted the Land Bill 2016 on February 22, 2016 and read it in the last 2015/2015 budget review session of Parliament three years after the former President Joyce Banda failed to assent it into law in 2013 due to protests from chiefs, women activists (Action Aid Malawi and NGO Gender Coordination Network) describing it as the way of dealing with chiefs in administering land as is the case in Tanzania while the women argued that the law was discriminatory towards them and children in accessing land resources thereby suggesting further consultations before it was passed into the law.
The 2016 Land Bill comprises ten Land-related bills including Land, Customary, Registered, Land Acquisitions (Amendment), Physical Planning, Land Survey, Local Government (Amendment), Malawi Housing (Amendment), Forestry (Amendment) and Public Roads.