The plane carrying Saulos Klaus Chilima, the vice president of the African state of Malawi, disappeared from radar on Monday, June 11. This was reported by the local information portal Malawi24.
It is known that the official took off on a Malawi Defense Forces plane from the country’s capital, Lilongwe, at 9:17 local time. About an hour later, the plane was supposed to land at Mzuzu airport: Chilima was flying there to attend the funeral of lawyer Ralph Kasambara. However, the plane did not arrive at the airport.
In addition to Chilima, there were nine other people on board.
Malawian President Lazarus Chakwera, upon receiving news of a possible plane crash, canceled his visit to the Bahamas and ordered an immediate search and rescue operation.
Malawi is a southern African country bordering Zambia, Mozambique, and Tanzania. Saulos Chilima is 51 years old and has served as vice president of the country since 2014.
In November 2022, the official was arrested on suspicion of interfering in the distribution of government contracts and receiving bribes from British businessman Zunet Sattar. In May of this year, the country’s prosecutor’s office dropped corruption charges against Chilima.
