A land battle has erupted and is refusing to die in the district of Nkhatabay as the Malawi Defence Force (MDF) is forcefully displacing residents, claiming the land they are holding is in firing range of the military.
According to a letter we have seen asking the president to intervene MDF have been annexing additional land in the areas of Kasasire, Bula and Usingini in the district of Nkhatabay into their firing range since 2016.
According to the letter, in 2018, MDF produced a new map which enclosed the areas of Kasasire, Bula and Usingini, engulfing land areas of five group village Headmans including the senior group Kasasire.
It is said that from 2021 until August 2024, MDF began demolishing people’s properties, arresting people for trespassing, destroying crops and livestock, and assaulting residents, leaving them homeless and traumatized.
“Following the death of TA Francis Mbwana in 2020, there was a power vacuum in the areas for three years (202-2023.) MDF took advantage of the gap to intensify evictions and land grabs, subjecting residents to severe persecution,” read the letter.
Speaking during the Malawi prison pass-out ceremony at Mapanga training in Blantyre on Friday, President Lazarus Chakwera admitted that things have turned bad in the areas of Kasasire, Bula and Usingini, despite the courts ruling in favour of MDF.
Chakwera said people were encroaching without following the laws, and MDF is breaking the law in the way they are handling the situation despite residents breaking the law for decades.
“There is a situation in which residents broke the laws and the MDF is not following the law in the way they are handling and there is tension, and they are saying I should intervene and make judgements as if am a judge of land lawbreakers, this tendency increasing always asking president to intervene and make judgements on things and this is happening because we don’t have a heart to respect our laws if we all follow the laws we can make all things right,” he said.
Some residents in the areas of Kasasire, Bula ndi Usingini are said to have leased their land spaces and the areas hold infrastructure developments like Schools, CCAP and Catholic Churches as reports indicate that historically MDF was allocated Viphya firing range by Traditional Authority Nabiot M’bwana in 1968 with a clearly defined boundaries along Lukanga and Fulumita streams.
