Malawi’s president said Tuesday that the country’s vice president was killed in a plane crash the day before, prompting a massive search.
The plane disappeared Monday morning, prompting a massive search and rescue operation for the vice president, Saulos Chilima, and the nine others on board.
In an address to the nation on Tuesday, President Lazarus Chakwera said the wreckage had been found and there were no survivors.
“Something terrible went wrong with this flight,” Mr Chakwera said.
He called Mr. Chilima, 51, a “good man” who “served his country with distinction.”
Details about the other victims were not immediately available.
The Malawian military plane carrying Mr. Chilima and nine others took off at 9:17 a.m. Monday from the capital, Lilongwe. He was bound for Mzuzu, less than an hour’s flight away, according to the government.
The plane was unable to land due to poor visibility caused by bad weather, Mr. Chakwera said in a televised speech Monday evening. The pilot was ordered to turn around, but a few minutes later the plane disappeared from radar.
Malawi authorities launched a massive rescue operation that continued through the night in the Chikangawa Forest, an uninhabited reserve that spans about 443 square miles.
On Tuesday morning, General Paul Phiri of the Malawi Defense Force said nearly 200 troops were involved in the search, which was hampered by heavy fog. Police officers, park rangers and Civil Aviation Authority employees were also taking part in the effort, he told a news conference.
Malawi authorities have also turned to other governments for help. The US Embassy in Lilongwe said it had loaned a C-12 aircraft to help with the search, while Mr Chakwera said he had requested technological support from neighboring countries, as well as Britain , Norway and Israel. On Tuesday morning, the Malawi Red Cross joined the search efforts.
Mr. Chilima was expected to run in the 2025 presidential elections.
He entered Malawi’s political scene a decade ago, abandoning his post as director of one of the country’s largest telecommunications companies during a successful presidential election campaign as a running mate. -presidency of Peter Mutharika in 2014.
The two men fell out in 2019, with Mr Chilima accusing Mr Mutharika of corruption and subsequently creating his own political party, the United Transformation Movement.
Once political rivals, Mr. Chakwera and Mr. Chilima formed a coalition that year after losing a flawed election. Both candidates successfully challenged the result and, after a judicial panel ruled in their favor, both men won a second vote that took place in 2020 on the same list.
In late 2022, Mr. Chilima was arrested by the country’s Anti-Corruption Bureau on charges that he received bribes from a businessman in exchange for government contracts. He has denied any wrongdoing.
Malawian authorities dropped the case and withdrew all charges against Mr. Chilima last month, but the scandal nonetheless tarnished his image as a politician who had vowed to end corruption.
Mr. Chilima was born in the central Ntcheu district of Malawi. He studied economics at the University of Malawi and earned a doctorate in knowledge management at the University of Bolton in Britain, according to his official profile. He is survived by his wife, Mary Chilima, and their two children.
