Malawi’s Vice President Dr. Saulos Chilima and 9 other people including his wife were killed when the plane they were travelling in crashed in the Chikangawa mountain range, the government said Tuesday. President Lazarus Chakwera declared Tuesday a national day of mourning.

“Unfortunately, all on board have perished in the crash,” the Office of the President and Cabinet said in a Tuesday morning statement. The confirmation came after more than a day-long search effort in a forested area in the mountains of northern Malawi. The military plane crashed Monday morning after it took off from the country’s capital Lilongwe.

Chilima, 51, and the other passengers had been headed to attend the funeral of the country’s former attorney general when their plane dropped off radar. Air traffic officials said the plane had been unable to land at Mzuzu airport, about 200 miles north of the capital, due to poor visibility, and the pilot had been advised to return to Lilongwe when the flight disappeared.

Addressing the nation on Tuesday, Chakwera said Chilima and his wife, along with seven military officers and another passenger, were in a a small military plane, said by the Associated Press to have been a Dornier 228-type twin propeller plane delivered to the Malawian army in 1988. The AP ascertained that information by cross-referencing the aircraft’s tail number, provided by Chakwera, with data provided by the ch-aviation website.  

Chilima, 51, had been seen in Malawi as a possible contender for next year’s presidential election.

A somewhat controversial figure, he’d been arrested in 2022 on graft allegations, amid reports that he’d received kickbacks from a businessman for government contracts.

Chilima consistently denied the charges, right up until last month, when they were dropped by the national prosecutor, who filed a notice for the discontinuation of the case.

In a televised national address Monday night, Chawera told the nation that the search and rescue operation would continue until Chilima’s plane was found.

“I know this is a heart breaking situation,” he said, “and we are all frightened and concerned.”

Several countries including the United States provided technological support in the search operation. 

In a statement posted Tuesday morning on social media, the U.S. Embassy in Lilongwe said it was “deeply concerned by the news of the crash” and added an offer of “all available assistance including a Defense  C-12 aircraft.” (CBS News)

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Soldiers are searching mountainous forests near a city in northern Malawi after a military plane carrying the country’s vice president and a former first lady went missing in the area Monday, President Lazarus Chakwera said.

The plane carrying 51-year-old Vice President Saulos Chilima, former first lady Shanil Dzimbiri and eight others left the southern African nation’s capital, Lilongwe, at 9:17 a.m. and had been expected to land 45 minutes later at Mzuzu International Airport, about 370 kilometers (230 miles) to the north.

But air traffic control told it to not attempt a landing and to turn around because of bad weather and poor visibility, Chakwera said in an address broadcast live on state TV channel MBC.

Air traffic control lost contact with the aircraft and it disappeared from radar a short time later, he said.

“I know this is a heartbreaking situation. I know we are all frightened and concerned. I too am concerned,” Chakwera said. “But I want to assure you that I am sparing no available resource to find that plane. And I am holding onto every fiber of hope that we will find survivors.”

Mzuzu is Malawi’s third biggest city and the capital of the northern region. It lies in a hilly, forested area dominated by the Viphya mountain range, which has vast plantations of pine trees.

The president vowed that search operations would continue through the night and said authorities using telecommunications towers tracked the last known position of the plane to a 10-kilometer (6-mile) radius in one of the plantations. That area was the focus of the Malawi Defense Force search and rescue operation, he said.

“I have given strict orders that the operation should continue until the plane is found,” Chakwera said.

Chakwera said the U.S., the U.K., Norway and Israel offered assistance in the search operation and had provided “specialized technologies” that the president hoped would help find the plane sooner.

Chakwera said Dzimbiri, the ex-wife of former President Bakili Muluzi, was also one of the passengers. The group was traveling to attend the funeral of a former government minister. Three of those onboard were the military crew flying the plane, the president said.

Chakwera asked Malawians to pray for all those onboard and their families.

Chilima has been vice president since 2020.

He was a candidate in the 2019 Malawian presidential election and finished third. That vote was won by incumbent Peter Mutharika but was annulled by Malawi’s Constitutional Court because of irregularities. Chakwera finished second in that election.

Chilima then joined Chakwera’s campaign as his running mate in an historic election rerun in 2020, when Chakwera was elected president. It was the first time in Africa that an election result that was overturned by a court resulted in a defeat for the sitting president.

The vice president had been facing corruption charges over allegations that he received money in return for influencing the awarding of government contracts, but prosecutors dropped the charges last month. That led to criticism that Chakwera’s administration was not taking a hard enough stance against graft.

Chilima was arrested in late 2022 and made several court appearances, but the trial has yet to start. He has denied the allegations. (AP Africa)

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