Mtandire woke up to the sound of political violence on Saturday morning when Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) supporters assaulted and severely injured a Malawi Congress Party (MCP) follower and vandalised property, just hours before former president Arthur Peter Mutharika addressed a rally at Chilimampunga ground.
In a chilling throwback to the darkest days of the DPP, suspected cadres stormed the township in lorries, uprooting MCP flags and assaulting residents.
By mid-morning, Daniel Mdeba, 38, lay bruised and bleeding after being hacked with a panga for allegedly trying to protect MCP symbols in his neighborhood. His crime. Living in a contested zone and refusing to watch in silence the DPP menace happening in the area.
Malawi Police Service spokesperson Peter Kalaya said Mdeba comes from Khasu Village, Senior Chief Mabuka, Mulanje, a district once a DPP stronghold, but currently residing in Mtandire.
By the time we were going to press, Mdeba was being treated at Likuni Hospital.
Kalaya said the assailants, who were planting DPP flags in the area while uprooting MCP flags and campaign posters, started attacking the residents who were trying to protest against the act, and in the process violently attacked and severely injured Mdeba who stood up against the perpetrators.
“They also damaged a vehicle belonging to an MCP campaign official in Mtandire–Mtsiriza Constituency,” Kalaya confirmed.
Eyewitness Jones Phiri told The Pangolin Online that the attackers arrived in the lorries armed with pangas and sticks, chanting party slogans.
“When some MCP followers tried to resist, they were outnumbered. One of them was badly beaten,” Phiri said.
MCP candidate for the area, George Zulu, condemned the violence and appealed for calm among his supporters.
“We are disappointed that the DPP continues to use violence as a tool of intimidation. We urge our followers not to retaliate but allow the law to take its course,” he said.
The DPP had not issued a comment by press time. Efforts to reach the party’s spokesperson Shadric Namalomba proved futile as calls went unanswered.
Hours later, at the very same rally that these violent cadres were clearing the ground for, Mutharika’s running mate Jane Ansah stood before the crowd and made a startling declaration: “Professor Mutharika respects the rule of law. He never tolerated shedding of blood and people demonstrated freely.”
For many Malawians, the irony was almost unbearable.
Here was the very same Jane Ansah, whose disputed handling of the 2019 presidential elections sparked months of deadly street protests, now painting her partner as a defender of democracy, all while blood was still drying on the streets of Mtandire.
To those who lived through the 2019 Human Rights Defenders Coalition (HRDC) demonstrations, her words evoked bitter memories. Under her watch as Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) chairperson, protesters were teargassed, beaten, and in some cases, shot at by security forces accused of acting in concert with panga-weirding ruling party loyalists.
On Saturday, the violence did not come from the state machinery, but from the same party she now serves, the DPP.
An investigation by The Pangolin Online has established that Saturday’s violence was not spontaneous.
According to party insiders, DPP shadow MPs from several Central Region districts, including Nkhotakota, Kasungu, Salima, and Mchinji, were instructed to ferry truckloads of supporters to Mtandire to swell the rally’s numbers, “create the optics of popularity and ready for war.”
The plan, one source said, was “to intimidate MCP strongholds by showing DPP muscle in the heart of Lilongwe.”
But the strategy backfired. The very people imported to demonstrate Mutharika’s relevance also unleashed the morning of terror in Mtandire, leaving residents furious at what they describe as “violence on order.”
“Some of the pangas and other weapons for the attack came with these ferried supporters. These people were not from here,” said a woman who asked not to be named for fear of reprisals.
This calculated show of force raises troubling questions about Mutharika’s campaign strategy.
On the one hand, he is attempting to project himself as a statesman ready to restore stability and dignity to the presidency. On the other, his campaign machinery appears dependent on intimidation, manufactured crowds, and recycled cadres from the violent playbook of 2019.
For critics, this is the paradox of the DPP under Mutharika. A party desperate to reclaim power but unable to shed the violent, anti-democratic tactics that cost it legitimacy five years ago.
“The imported crowds and the beating of an innocent citizen completely expose the hollowness of Jane Ansah’s claim that Mutharika respects freedoms. It shows that the DPP is still addicted to violence as a campaign tool,” said a political analyst from the University of Malawi.
For Mtandire residents, Saturday’s events were a reminder that the ghosts of Malawi’s violent past are far from exorcised. The imported crowds may have cheered at Chilimampunga Ground, but for those beaten, bruised, and silenced, the DPP’s message was clear: “we want power at any cost even when it means shedding blood.”
As one elderly man summed it up while pointing at torn MCP flags on the roadside: “They say they want to save Malawi, but if they start with blood, what will they end with?”
