By Kumaliwopa Mawa
Namuleri Farms Raid Exposes a Regime at War with Productivity
The attempted raid on Namuleri Farms in Kasungu South is not an isolated law-enforcement action. It is a clear, calculated, and dangerous abuse of state power, exposing a ruling elite that has abandoned governance and embraced persecution as policy.
On Tuesday, 16 December 2025, the Malawi Police Service—acting not as a neutral institution but as political foot soldiers—attempted to execute an illegal search at a thriving commercial farm owned by the Leader of the Opposition, Honourable Simplex Chithyola Banda. This operation was reportedly instigated by desperate DPP power brokers who now view independent success as an existential threat.
The justification offered was as flimsy as it was insulting: that Namuleri Farms was allegedly using subsidised fertiliser sourced from NEEF. This accusation alone reveals a political class so detached from real production that it cannot distinguish subsistence inputs from commercial-scale agriculture. It was not a mistake. It was either ignorance or deliberate deceit—both disqualifying for leadership.
Crucially, what the architects of this witch-hunt ignored—or chose to defy—was the existence of a valid court stay order. The judiciary had spoken. The law was clear. Yet the police still proceeded, confirming growing fears that Malawi’s security institutions are being weaponised for partisan interests.
When officers arrived at Namuleri Farms, they did not encounter criminality. They encountered industry.
They found the owner himself—boots in the soil—working alongside his employees. No hiding. No evasion. Just productivity. Calmly and confidently, Chithyola Banda presented the stay order and informed the officers that their presence was unlawful. What followed was a moment that symbolised the moral collapse of the regime that sent them.
Instead of intimidation, the officers received education.
The Leader of the Opposition personally toured them through the farm—not to legitimise illegality, but to demonstrate scale, discipline, and truth. He instructed them to report back a simple, devastating fact: Namuleri Farms spends approximately K600 million annually on fertiliser alone.
Let the question be asked publicly:
Can NEEF, even in theory, sustain such an operation?
The answer is self-evident—and humiliating for those who peddled the lie.
The officers were further told to report that Namuleri Farms produces maize yields capable of feeding a family for over 40 years, outperforming even some long-established commercial estates. This is not coincidence. It is not politics. It is five generations of farming excellence, built through knowledge, discipline, and respect for the land.
This is precisely what terrifies the ruling clique.
They understand looting. They understand patronage. They understand extraction.
They do not understand wealth that is grown, not stolen.
Namuleri Farms represents everything this regime resents: independence, productivity, and success beyond state capture. While the farm’s wealth rises from soil and sweat, the wealth of many in power has flowed from public coffers, fertilised by corruption, Cashgate-style plunder, and institutional decay.
Let there be no confusion:
This was never about fertiliser.
It was about envy.
It was about fear.
It was about a government so insecure that it sees successful citizens—especially those in opposition—as enemies to be crushed.
A state that raids farms instead of fixing the economy has failed.
A government that intimidates producers instead of empowering them has collapsed morally.
A regime that deploys police where policy is needed has already lost the future.
The Namuleri Farms incident is a warning. When institutions are bent to settle political scores, no citizen is safe. Today it is a commercial farmer in opposition. Tomorrow it is any Malawian who succeeds outside the ruling party’s patronage.
Malawians are watching.
They are connecting the dots.
They know who works.
And they know who steals.
History is unforgiving to regimes that wage war on productivity.
And this one has already written its own indictment.
