Rights body irks ex-MYPs

Former Malawi Young Pioneers (MYPs) say they are not amused with remarks by the Centre for Human Rights and Rehabilitation (CHRR), questioning government’s decision to pay them their benefits.

Government has started paying the MYPs their benefits, but CHRR executive director Undule Mwakasungula said government should have prioritised compensating victims of the group’s brutality during the one-party State.

However, the former MYPs’ leader Gray Chibaya Chisale on Monday said Mwakasungula was not the right person to comment on their plight.

“He [Mwakasangula] does not understand what MYP was and what it did to the country. This is probably because he was in exile,” said Chisale.

But Mwakasungula said CHRR wants government to set a right precedent.

“MYP was a terror group. They should not hide because government is paying them. That does not purify them. If people went into exile, who forced them to do so? It was the same MYP,” he alleged.

Mwakasungula said not all former MYPs terrorised people.

“It pains me so much to see government prioritising paying these people instead of beginning with the victim of MYP torture. There are people who were killed, maimed and do not know why the MYP did this to them,” he said.

Chisale said at least three quarters of the former employees have already been paid.

“We are 4 336 people claiming our dues from government. Initially, government was expected to spend K300 million [about $909 000], but the figure is likely to go up to K700 million [about $2.12 million],” he said.

Chisale said the individual payments ranged from K2 000 to K700 000.

He said they deserve pension and gratuity and compensation because they were civil servants who lost their job at gunpoint and torture.