There is a familiar quality to disputes in Malawi’s public sector: less argument over policy than over who, exactly, is in charge. The latest instalment comes from Umodzi Holdings, where the chief executive, Kamlepo Kalua, says the state-owned hospitality group is profitable and preparing to publish a positive quarterly report, even as the company’s board maintains that he has been suspended from his post.
Kalua, the former MP for Rumphi East, paints a picture of a company on the up. According to him, Umodzi has performed strongly in the most recent quarter and a performance report will be released shortly.
Instead, attention has shifted to a more immediate question: whether Kalua remains at the helm at all.
In a notice to staff dated 13 October, board chairperson Geobra Kamanga announced that Kalua had been placed on administrative suspension with immediate effect. Jonathan Mwakyelu, the director of finance and administration, was appointed acting chief executive pending further developments.
Kalua, however, rejects the board’s version of events. He says he has neither been formally informed nor provided with any explanation. Suspension, he argues, is hardly meaningful without reasons attached.
Kamanga disagrees. He says the decision was communicated and that the grounds for it are known to Kalua, though “personal to him”.
The chairperson has indicated that the board wishes to engage the chief executive on questions of professional conduct within a corporate environment.
Beyond that, little has been said publicly, leaving observers to speculate about a matter on which those involved are notably reluctant to elaborate.
The government’s Comptroller of Statutory Corporations, Stuart Ligomeka, has chosen not to be drawn into the dispute, insisting it remains a matter for the board itself.
The backdrop is not insignificant. Umodzi Holdings controls some of Malawi’s most prominent hospitality assets, including the President Hotel, the Bingu wa Mutharika International Convention Centre, the presidential villas and Malawi Square. In recent years the company has often been cited as a rare example of a state enterprise moving in the right direction, reporting profits of K1.2 billion in 2022/23 and K1.9 billion in 2023/24.
Whether Kalua deserves credit for that turnaround is a separate question. The available records do not establish his role during those reporting periods. Yet the timing of the present dispute inevitably raises eyebrows. It is easier to remove a chief executive than to explain why a supposedly successful state company finds itself embroiled in a public power struggle.
The episode also arrives amid broader tensions in the governance of public institutions. Only last week, Blantyre Water Board chief executive Yeremiah Chihana was dismissed following a protracted legal battle with his board. Like Kalua, Chihana lost his parliamentary seat in the September 2025 election.
Perhaps the coincidence is just that. Yet when senior executives and boards increasingly find themselves settling scores in public, the question is not merely who wins these confrontations, but what they reveal about the fragile relationship between political authority, corporate governance and Malawi’s state-owned enterprises.
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