Police arrests Manase ‘Magagada’ seller

The police in Blantyre have arrested a man suspected to be selling the poisonous alcohol which has killed eight people at Manase Township.

It is reported that the deceased consumed a certain type of liquor popularly known as Ambuye Nditengeni or Magagada.

Confirming the arrest, South West Region Police publicist Joseph Sauka has revealed that the suspect is expected to appear in court this week to answer charges levelled against him.

“I can confirm that we have arrested a man who was actually selling the alcohol that has costed the lives of people at Manase and right now he is in our custody. Anytime soon he will be appearing in court to answer the charges of alleged food poisoning,” Sauka explained.

Meanwhile, the District Health Office (DHO) in Blantyre is also conducting investigations on the matter.

Spokesperson for the DHO Chrissie Banda says one person has also been admitted and they are waiting for preliminary report on the autopsy conducted on the bodies.

“Someone has also been admitted at Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital (QECH), meaning we are still remaining with 4 at the referral hospital, one at ICU and 3 at the ward. We have done a postmortem and preliminary results are suggesting alcohol poisoning but now we ae still waiting for the results that might take some days so we do not have confirmatory lab results as of now,” Banda said.

Currently, a youth group called Youth Achievers for Development (YAD) is calling for swift regulation of alcohol trade.

YAD executive director Jefferson Milanzi has described the incident as a wake-up call for the authorities to regulate liquor trade.

“They need to come up with some policies that will be able to manage such situations but when you look at our councils, when you look at the policies they are just so loose. Young people are consuming deadly alcohol and I believe this is a wakeup call for policy holders so that maybe we could do something as a country to help the young ones,” Milanzi explained.

Concurring with Milanzi, Drug Fight Malawi chairperson Nelson Zakeyu says; “We all have that responsibility to protect young people from harmful consumption of alcohol. We need to mobilize other well-wishers because not only the government is responsible. We will continue asking the government to start implementing the National Alcohol Policy that was approved in 2017.”