Police killed our son—family

Their fingers point unwaveringly at the Malawi police. Their son, Kondwani, left home in rude health on July 2, only to return a walking corpse before finally dying last Thursday, July 5.

Police, they say, know something about his death. More to the point, the law enforcers killed him, says the family of Kondwani Chimphamba, 21, of Nkolokoti in Blantyre.

The family engaged pathologist Dr Charles Dzamalala to establish the cause of their son’s death.

Dzamalala confirmed conducting the post-mortem in an interview on Saturday and briefing the family and the police, but said the report will come out on 15 July because he is busy.

However, the family indicated that in his oral preliminary report, Dzamalala said the cause of death was head injuries.

“He told us that Kondwani received a blow in the left side of his head and knocked a hard surface with his right side and bled in both sides of his head. It is that internal bleeding that killed him,” said Gracewell Chimphamba, Kondwani’s uncle.

The family, led by Harvey Changa, Kondwani’s step-father, on Friday morning narrated the events that led to Kondwani’s death.

“On July 2, Kondwani told his aunt that he was going into town. Around 6pm, he was at the PTC shop next to Limbe Police. But when he went to pass urine across the road, police arrested him and detained him at Limbe Police,” said Changa.

He said after Kondwani’s cousin, who was with him, paid a K2 000 (about $8) bribe, the deceased was given bail late that night. But soon after he got out of the station, he lay down and was vomiting blood. He couldn’t walk.

When Changa reached the station at about 10pm, an officer advised him to take the young man to hospital, which he promptly did.

“He could not respond to anything, and when we got to Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital he exhibited mental problems and became violent. We decided to take him home to prevent him from destroying things at the hospital,” he said.

According to Changa, when Kondwani reached home, he calmed down and fell asleep.

He never woke up from the sleep.

He was taken back to QECH while in a coma. By then, his head had swollen and his jaws could not open.

On July 5, around 6pm, Kondwani breathed his last.

“I was there when he died. It was painful. Kondwani was a good boy whose name really befitted him; he loved chatter, he was intelligent in school and we depended on him for many things around the house. We would have loved if he lived his full life. That wish can never be compensated,” said Changa.

But Limbe Police spokeswoman Chifundo Chibwezo contested the family’s version of the story, saying the station has no file of Kondwani because they never arrested him.

She said police kept him at their premises for his own protection because he was too drunk to walk.

“He was never put in a cell. He was kept on the steps at our offices. When his father came, we advised him to take his son to hospital because he was vomiting blood,” she said.

Chibwezo also denied the existence of a cousin, who the family claim helped in posting bail, saying Kondwani was alone.

The purported cousin, Mphatso Chalera, however, vows that he was with Kondwani the whole day and that he is ready to identify the officer who received the bribe to release the deceased.

Chalera trashed the police claim that Kondwani might have drunk on an empty belly, saying about 30 minutes before the arrest, the two ate at a restaurant in Limbe.

“We walked all the way from Limbe Bus Depot to the PTC. We ate, and we were causing no trouble despite being a little drunk,” he said.

Asked to explain the injuries that the family suspects to have come from police, Chibwezo said the deceased might have sustained them elsewhere.

Kondwani had just completed his human resource management studies at Soche Technical College.

The family says they will chart the way forward after burying Kondwani today (Sunday).

Earlier this year, police also beat to death a Natural Resources College student, Edson Msiska.

Police claimed that Msiska had died of natural causes, but his family challenged them by engaging Dzamalala who found the cause of death to be severe battery.