On April 5 2024, Parliament passed the Older Persons Act.
The landmark law criminalises abuse of elder persons, establishes protection orders and provides monthly grants to persons aged 70 and above.
President Lazarus Chakwera signed the Bill into law on May 19 2024 and it came into force on September 16 2024.
However, its implementation is almost zero.
The K10.9 trillion 2025/26 National Budget excludes the elderly persons’ grant and the National Steer-ing Committee mandated by the Act has not been established.
The Ministry of Gender, Children, Community Development and Social Welfare confirmed that disbursement was “awaiting resource allocation”, but provided no timeline. Malawi Netwok of Elderly Per-sons Organisations (Manepo) is “actively engaging donors” to fund a law the govern-ment passed and then abandoned.
Meanwhile, an Afrobarometer survey found that 74 percent of Malawians believe strongly in the existence of witchcraft and that older people, especially older women, are at the greatest risk of being targeted.
Legal reform alone cannot close that gap.
The colonial-era Witchcraft Act of 1911, which criminalises accusing someone of witch-craft has never been meaningfully enforced.
It is now being considered for reforms that human rights defenders warn could worsen attacks on the elderly.
Time up
Zayenjeza. We have had enough.
The killing of the elderly is not a cultural matter, but a governance failure and a constitu-tional crisis.
Declaring a State of Emergency is the beginning of the accountability structure that makes the work possible.
1. Declare and resource a national emergency on violence against older persons.
Ring-fence emergency budget lines for police in the high-risk districts of Mzimba, Dowa, Kasungu, Ntcheu, Chikwawa, Nsanje and Mulanje.
Deploy mobile courts to the hotspots. A life lost to a mob while a court sits two districts away is a preventable death.
2. Fund and implement the Older Persons Act. The 2026/27 budget must include the elderly persons’ grant and the National Steering Committee. A law that exists only on paper is an insult to everyone who advocated for it.
3. Prosecute the 88-plus unresolved murder cases and the Ministry of Justice must provide a public timeline for every pending homicide case involving an elderly victim.
As Manepo executive director Andrew Kavala warns, perpetrators easily evade justice because they know that the system does not prioritise older persons.
4. Convene a national task force of chiefs, faith leaders, civil society and government. Replicate the inter-institutional model used during the albinism crisis, giving traditional and religious leaders a mandate to protect, not merely to condemn after the act.
5. Launch a sustained national behaviour change campaign because legal reforms cannot change the majority who strongly believe in witchcraft.
Radio, community drama and school curricula must address the belief systems that make witchcraft accusations a death sentence. This is a defence of life.
Besides, any Witchcraft Act revision must involve human rights organisations, including Humanists International who raised the alarm at the UN Human Rights Council’s 52nd session.
We have done it before
Malawi has something that similar responses in Tanzania, Zambia and Ghana lacked: A proven model used to tackle attacks on persons with albinism.
We know it works, but are we willing to extend the same value of life to the elderly?
An elderly woman is accused because her eyesight is failing and a child fell sick. An old man is dragged from his home because he lives alone.
There is no police statement, docket or day in court. There is a rumour, then a crowd, then fire and stones. By sunrise, there is another family preparing a body while the rest of us look away.
We call this mob justice, but the word justice is misplaced. This is murder. Every time we soften the language, wait for the next budget or allow piling cases to gather dust in the Ministry of Justice’s filing cabinets, we help dig the next grave.
Declare the emergency. Fund the law. Prosecute the killers. Protect the grandparents who still sleep with their shoes on, fearing for their lives.
By Habiba Osman: The author is the MHRC executive secretary, but is writing in her personal capacity as a human rights defender
