Chinese investors threaten to leave
An official from the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China has said increased cases of violence in Malawi are threatening Chinese investors such that some may relocate to neighbouring countries if the situation does not improve.
The sentiments by Wang Jiaxin Hudson, a counsellor in the economic and commercial counsellor’s office of the Chinese Embassy, come at a time armed robbers attacked Chinese nationals working for the Fifth Bureau of the China Railway at Area 9 in Lilongwe on Thursday and went away with K5 million ($10 000) cash.
“Insecurity in Malawi is getting out of control. What we are seeing in Malawi’s roads are a lot of traffic police officers and not armed cops who would scare thieves away.
“Our hope is that government and the Inspector General of Police will do their best to improve the security to bring back investors confidence,” he said.
Wang said in the event that security is not improved, many Chinese investors who could have come in the country will not and those who are already here may think of relocating to other countries such as Zambia, Mozambique and Tanzania.
In the latest Area 9 incident, he said, about four armed robbers followed a car carrying the Chinese national from a bank up to the entrance of a compound where they shot at the car’s petrol tank and stole cash amounting to K5 million.
Wang said in the past year alone, about eight Chinese investors, including medical doctors, have been targeted by robbers and had their valuables stolen.
“We are very concerned with increased cases of robberies affecting the Chinese nationals. The deteriorating security in Malawi will completely erode the confidence of many investors and, at the end of the day, the robbers are ruining the future of the Malawi nation.
“Every time a Chinese national is robbed, the police just tell us that they have made arrests and are investigating the matter but we have never been told how the cases conclude,” he said.
Wang said robbers are not only destroying Malawi today, but are also hampering the future economic growth of the country because no investor wants to go to a country where there is insecurity.
“There are several Chinese investors who are interested to come to Malawi to invest in mining, agriculture and manufacturing and if we tell them that there is insecurity, will they come? But we cannot tell them that Malawi is not safe because we want this relationship to be a win-win one,” he said.
Police spokesperson Rhoda Manjolo confirmed the recent incident, but could not give more details, saying investigations are ongoing.
“We are asking Malawians to help police track these criminals because as police we cannot work in isolation. We will always do our best to make sure that Malawians as well as their property is protected all the time,” she said.
Recently in Lilongwe, robbers also attacked Golden Peacock Shopping Mall, which is owned by Chinese investors. The incident was the second within eight months.
I totally agree with the Chinese envoy, the DPP govt need to have a grip on this armed robbery issue. We already lost the confidence of our donors in the western world and we cannot afford to lose the very few investors we currently have.
Most Malawians voted for the DPP regime becoz of their promise to root out armed robberies and bring back the much needed security in our country. But what we have seen during the past 7 months is a total collapse of security not only for foreigners but also for the locals. How do we expect our country to develop when hard working people are being robbed by idiots who does not care about the future of our children let alone about the reputation of our country on the international stage?
Every Malawian need to take security seriously, for instance there are many landlords in many towns across the country who are letting out their properties to people who have no job or any form of money generating business, where do they expect these tenants get their monthly lent money from. Every landlord should know the profession of their tenants or at least their source of income.
There are also many Malawian women who put their marriage first before the livelihood of fellow Malawians. These women know full well that their husbands have no source of income but they can never report them to the police let alone ask their husbands where they get all the expensive electronic gadgets and money they bring into their homes every night. Because of poverty most Malawian women are prepared to keep their marriage despite knowing full well that their partners are thieves, what a shame.
If every landlord can report suspicious tenants to the police and if all women can report to the police their suspicious husbands or partners it would go a long way in cubing this evil in our country.
In fact I would like to ask our parliament to pass a law where women married to thieves or robbers should be prosecuted together with their husbands when evidence suggests that they knew all along that their husband were thieves. This would encourage women to report their partners to the police before more Malawians lose their lives or property. Desperate times need desperate measures.