PRETORIA-(MaraviPost)-As public scrutiny intensifies over the Director of Public Prosecutions’ (DPP) controversial decision to discontinue a high-profile wildlife-linked corruption case, authorities in South Africa have reportedly re-arrested one of Malawi’s most wanted ivory trafficking suspects.
Forty-six-year-old Chancy Kaunda, a notorious figure in regional wildlife trafficking networks, has been on the run for years.
Investigators believe he served as a key facilitator for an Asian-led smuggling syndicate, coordinating the transportation of large quantities of illicit ivory across Eastern and Southern Africa between 2002 and 2013.
Court records seen by Maravi Post reveal that Chancy and his brother, Patrick Kaunda, were first arrested in Mzuzu on 23 May 2013 after authorities intercepted a truck carrying 781 elephant tusks weighing 2,640 kilograms.
The truck, registration number KA 4849, had travelled from Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, into Malawi through the Songwe border post.
During investigations, Chancy reportedly confessed that he and his brother had been hired by two Chinese nationals, known locally as brothers Steve Wang and Peter Wang, to transport the massive consignment.
The brothers were re-arrested in Malawi on 21 November 2017 over their role in the smuggling operation.
In 2019, they were convicted and ordered to pay a fine of MK5 million each or serve eight years in hard labour.
However, despite paying the fines, in April 2020, the supreme Court in Malawi ordered that the two men should serve the sentence of eight years, overturning the original decision.
The two men allegedly evaded serving their prison sentence and disappeared.
Since then, Malawi Police have been pursuing the fugitives and enlisted the assistance of South African authorities through INTERPOL after investigations traced Chancy Kaunda to South Africa.
Confirming the development, Director of the Department of National Parks and Wildlife (DNPW), Brighton Kunchedwa, said Kaunda was arrested in South Africa following extensive surveillance by INTERPOL, which tracked his whereabouts and established his residence.
“It is true that Chancy Kaunda has been arrested in South Africa after years on the run.
This is very exciting news for us as a country because it demonstrates Malawi’s commitment to fighting wildlife crime and ensuring that offenders are brought to justice,” said Kunchedwa.
He added that the arrest should send a strong warning to other wildlife criminals that they cannot evade justice indefinitely.
Kunchedwa said the government is now working towards having Kaunda deported to Malawi so that he can serve the prison sentence that has remained outstanding since his conviction in 2019.
“My understanding is that the Malawi Police Service will work closely with their counterparts in South Africa and through INTERPOL processes to facilitate his return to Malawi, where he will be recommitted to prison to serve his sentence,” he said.
The Kaunda brothers are also wanted by Tanzanian authorities in connection with the seizure of 347 ivory tusks weighing 1,084.9 kilograms in Dar es Salaam on 4 July 2013.
Tanzanian investigators suspect them of organising and financing the smuggling of ivory from Tanzania between January 2008 and June 2013.
Investigators further link the brothers to several major international ivory seizures.
Among the most significant was the 2002 seizure of 6.2 tonnes of ivory in Singapore.
The shipment, originating from Malawi, which had been transported from Durban and falsely declared as stone sculptures, is believed to have been smuggled overland from Malawi to Beira, Mozambique, by Chancy Kaunda before being loaded onto a vessel bound for South Africa.
Authorities determined that the ivory originated from Zambia, Mozambique, Tanzania and Malawi. Shipping documents listed the consignor as Peter Wang of Seng Luck Trading in Lilongwe, operating through what investigators later described as a fake company.
Intelligence reports further suggest that Chancy worked directly with the Wang brothers and facilitated at least 14 ivory shipments using the Malawi-Mozambique-Beira route to destinations in Asia, including Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore, between 2010 and 2015.
Peter Wang is known to have died, however his brother Steve, has been traced by investigative journalists to a luxury house in Phnom Penh, where he resides with his Cambodian wife, living off the proceeds of many years operating in the illegal wildlife trade.
The consignments were routinely disguised as precious and semi-precious stones or timber products, according to investigators.
The latest developments come amid renewed questions over Malawi’s commitment to combating wildlife crime after the DPP recently discontinued the corruption case involving convicted Chinese wildlife trafficker Lin Yunhua.
It is reported that Lin Yunhua took over the illicit wildlife trafficking empire in Malawi following the decline of the Wang brothers’ operations, raising fresh concerns that powerful trafficking networks continue to operate despite years of high-profile arrests and convictions.
The re-arrest of Chancy Kaunda is therefore likely to reignite debate over whether Malawi’s fight against wildlife crime is gaining ground—or whether some of the region’s most notorious ivory syndicates remain beyond the reach of justice.
