Organizers of post-election demonstrations slated for Friday have refused to cancel the protests in Mzuzu.
The development comes the Mzuzu City Council on Wednesday asked organizers of the demonstrations to think of changing dates for the protests in the city to pave way for Mzuzu University graduation ceremony slated for the same day.
The council said it will be difficult to have the demonstrations in the city and at the same time have the graduation ceremony on security grounds.
The Mzuzu City Council further said the university intend to conduct the ceremony at the Mzuzu Stadium which seems to be the meeting point for the demonstrations.
However, one of the organizers for the protests in the city Happy Mhango said they will not shift the date arguing that the demonstrations will not be done at the Mzuni campus or at the stadium.
Mhango said the demonstrations will be done in streets and says he don’t think that the protests will not in any way affect the graduation ceremony hence no need to change the date for the demos in the city.
“We wanted clarification on the letter which they brought us because they are not even telling whether they will do the graduation ceremony at the Mzuni campus or Mzuzu stadium. So if you look at that considering the Katoto route to the Civic centre, I think there is no clarity.
“Demos are not done in the stadium and are not done at the Mzuni campus. So we were in view of this and we had that we will carry on with the demonstrations. Mzuni letter shows that invited guests will be seated by 08:00 while demos starts at 09:30 and we don’t think the demos will be destructive.” said Mhango.
