As the rift in the former governing Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) continues to deepen, party leader Professor Arthur Peter Mutharika on Sunday fired Kondwani Nankhumwa as vice president for the Southern Region.
Mutharika has since appointed Nankhumwa – a DPP presidential aspirant – as his own advisor on undisclosed affairs.
Nankhumwa has been fired alongside the party’s Director of Women Cecilia Chazama. In their place, the former Head of State has appointed his cousin, George Chaponda, as vice president for the South while Mary Navicha is now the party’s Director of Women.
The firing (re-assignment) of Nankhumwa and Chazama come barely a day after Mutharika moved the party’s Secretary General Grezelder Jeffrey to the position of vice president of the Central Region, replacing Uladi Mussa, who was recently pardoned by President Dr. Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera from his jail sentence.
Jeffrey has since dragged APM to court, arguing only the convention can remove her since she was elected at a party convention ahead of the 2029 tripartite elections.
Nankhumwa was not immediately available to comment on his firing.
But commenters are condemning Mutharika for his undemocratic tendencies and suppressing democracy in the party.
