Malawi plans to extradite Chinese ‘Susu’

Malawi has started extradition proceedings against Chinese Lu Ke, popularly known as Susu, who bolted to Zambia and was arrested on Sunday following revelations in a BBC documentary that he was exploiting children.

Department of Immigration and Citizenship Services Central Region spokesperson Pasqually Zulu said yesterday Susu will be brought back to face trial.

He said they suspect that Susu used uncharted routes to escape to Zambia.

Said Zulu: “We suspected that he bolted the country using uncharted routes, as such, we shared the information with our counterparts both in Mozambique and Zambia.”

In a separate interview, National Police deputy spokesperson Harry Namwaza also said Susu will be extradited to Malawi as soon as all processes are done.

Malawi Human Rights Commission (MHRC) executive secretary Habiba Osman hailed the immigration officials for being vigilant to find Susu.

She said: “We sincerely hope this is true. We would also like to understand how he fled the country.”

Commenting on the matter, Centre for Democracy and Economic Development Initiatives executive director Sylvester Namiwa said while the arrest is a step in the right direction, they still question the credibility of security agents in Malawi as it took the BBC to expose Susu and the Zambia police to arrest him.

Meanwhile, the Child Rights Clinic in the University of Malawi’s Faculty of Law said it will continue with its planned demonstrations set for today (Tuesday) to show their anger over the racist exploitation and abuse of poor children by Susu.

Speaking in an interview yesterday, legal clinic manager Alexious Kamangira said the issues are fundamental and beyond the arrest.

“We are happy that something has been done, we are looking forward to a legal process that will make sure that justice has been delivered,” he said.

The group plans to march from Njewa Village, one of the areas where children were exploited and abused, to the Chinese Embassy in Lilongwe.

Last week, a documentary broadcast on BBC African Eye investigation programme exposed the video in which BBC journalist Runako Celina and Malawian journalist Henry Mhango found that Lu was shooting 380 videos of children a day, earning him about K77 million, but was paying them less than $1.

One of the videos depicts children standing behind a placard bearing Chinese phrases and singing. Translated in English, the phrase reads: “I am a black monster! My IQ is low”. n