Kondwani Kamiyala

July 30 2012 was the first day I visited Majete Wildlife Reserve. It was history in the making, as four lions were expected to be translocated from South Africa to make the Chikwawa tourist attraction the only one in Malawi where you could find the Big Five. Only two lions and a lioness from Robin Pope Safaris made it to the reserve, as a lion died 45 minutes into the four-hour flight. As the pacified lions lay in a ‘boma’—a quarantined of the park, where they would stay to acclimatize before being released into the wild—we could only marvel that, at last, there is a chance to spot lions, elephants, rhinos, leopards and hippos in the 700 square kilometre reserve. A visit to the reserve last week, which African Parks has been managing since 2003 when animal populations were dwindling, brought better news. There are now eight lions. An able guide, who knows the reserve as the back of his arm, Jimmy Chikombe says the lions Chimwala and Sapitwa and the lioness Shi...

Sixty-six kilometres from the Malawi commercial capital Blantyre, the Mulanje Mountain sprouts from the lush-green tea plantations and rises high into the skies. The highest point, Sapitwa (which literally means unreachable) is at 3,002 metres above sea level, the highest point in southern central Africa. For the adventurer, Mulanje Mountain, which is fondly referred to as The Island in the Sky, is the next destination. It bears the monicker from the peaks that form ‘islands’ on the massif. It was around six o’clock in the morning when I, together with my guide Albert Marumo, set out from the Likhubula Forestry Lodge, where I spent the night. From a curios vendor near the lodge, I got a sturdy hard-carved Mulanje cedar walking stick and began the four hour hike to one of the more than 20 peaks on the mountain, Chambe. The peak is perched at 2,500 metres above sea level. It was an idyllic hike of great views of the world miles below and a trek through evergreen forests in the r...

July 4, 2019 If there is one thing that is so hard to say, it is goodbye. It has been hard for me, for one, to see my colleague Suzgo Khunga bidding farewell not only to those that have worked with her, but even to you dear reader. For three years, I have followed her entries and I daresay she has informed some of my opinions on certain socio-political and economic hazy areas. Not to mention her able news-writing and insightful reporting skills, which I have been able to follow since 2004 or thereabouts. Join me in wishing Su or ABC—Assistant Bureau Chief—as we fondly called her in the Nation Publications Limited (NPL) corridors, the best of times at her next call of point. I know of her hard work and determination and it is my hope these are traits that will continue to be part of her being. I am not a particular fan of long and dreary speeches, but speeches that change humanity, the terse ones, strike deep cords within me. The American President Abraham Linco...