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Malawi: President Bingu wa Mutharika dies
former Malawi President., Bingu wa Mutharika. PHOTO/File
Malawi’s President Bingu wa Mutharika died after suffering a heart attack, political and hospital sources said on Friday, but the government’s official silence has created political suspense over his succession.
Malawi was plunged into a long night of intrigue after Mutharika’s heart attack on Thursday in the capital Lilongwe. He was rushed to hospital, but doctors were unable to save him, a source at the hospital said.
“He died… after two hours of resuscitation,” the source said.
“The president died yesterday, and his body has been flown to South Africa for embalming and for the process to be dignified, the official announcement will come later on,” a government official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
An official in Mutharika’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party also confirmed the death, and indicated that an announcement would come later on Friday.
But most Malawians were left in the dark about his death, with state radio only reporting that he had been airlifted to South Africa, creating a public impression that he was undergoing treatment.
Opposition figure Humphrey Mvula said that the lack of official communication was “making it difficult to comment on the sticky issue of incapacitation” of the president and his eventual succession.
