Wrong phone numbers for wrong signals, was it a set up? Fresh Chilima’s plane crash inquiry

LILONGWE-(MaraviPost)-Fresh testimony before the Parliamentary Ad Hoc Committee investigating the June 10, 2024 Chikangawa plane crash has raised serious questions about the information supplied to Malawi’s search and rescue teams during the crucial first hours after the aircraft disappeared.

Recent testimony from officials of Airtel Malawi and Telekom Networks Malawi (TNM) indicates that some phone numbers initially provided for tracing did not belong to passengers on the aircraft.

The mobile operators were brought into the search shortly before 2pm, but they initially worked with incomplete or inaccurate information about the people aboard the plane.

This development is significant because mobile-phone information was among the tools being used by authorities to narrow down the aircraft’s possible location.

Former MACRA Director General Daud Suleman told the inquiry that Airtel eventually provided information showing that a phone associated with one of the passengers had connected to the Raplai tower.

However, he cautioned that the tower information could not, by itself, establish the precise location of the aircraft.

TNM officials similarly told the committee that some numbers initially supplied were not active on its network, while other information had to be reconstructed using customer-registration records.

The evidence therefore raises an important question: How did inaccurate or incomplete telephone information enter the official search process, and how much time was lost as a result?

That question should now be investigated through documentary evidence, telecommunications records, official communication logs and testimony from everyone involved in the search and rescue operation.

It would, however, be premature to conclude from the evidence currently in the public domain that Malawi Congress Party (MCP) operatives deliberately supplied the wrong numbers or that any political actors already knew where the aircraft had crashed.

Such an allegation would require direct evidence showing who supplied the numbers, where the information originated, what those individuals knew at the time and whether there was an intention to mislead the search operation.

The parliamentary inquiry is therefore important because it can establish the chain of communication from the moment the aircraft disappeared to the eventual discovery of the wreckage.

There is also evidence that members of communities around Nthungwa reported information about the aircraft to authorities on the day of the accident.

Recent testimony has raised questions about when such reports reached the police and what action followed.

This means responsibility should not automatically be placed on individual Malawi Police Service officers who were working with the information available to them at the time.

Instead, the inquiry should establish whether the search operation was affected by wrong telephone numbers, delayed communication, incomplete passenger information, limitations in telecommunications tracing, operational decisions or failures in coordination between institutions.

The Malawi Police Service should be assessed on the evidence of what information it received, when it received it, what instructions it was given and what actions it took.

At the same time, if the inquiry establishes that anyone knowingly provided false information, deliberately withheld critical information or interfered with the search, those findings should be clearly identified and supported by evidence.

The central issue is therefore not about protecting or blaming any political party.

It is about establishing what happened during the hours when nine people, including former Vice-President Saulos Chilima, were missing and determining whether any avoidable failures contributed to the delay in locating the aircraft.

The Parliamentary Ad Hoc Committee has said its investigation will rely on documentary records, witness testimony, site visits and specialist input, with the stated objective of producing a thorough, credible, transparent and fair inquiry.

The public now needs the committee to follow the evidence wherever it leads.

This includes establishing who supplied the initial telephone numbers, why some were incorrect, when the correct numbers became available, what information the mobile operators provided and how that information was acted upon.

Those are the questions that can turn the current allegations into established facts.

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