Court halts construction of Gandhi statue
Publish date: 05 November 2018
Issue Number: 798
Diary: IBA Legalbrief Africa
Category: Malawi
Campaigners in Malawi yesterday won an injunction to temporarily halt work on a statue of Mahatma Gandhi in the commercial capital as part of a $10m construction deal with Delhi. BBC News reports that they told the High Court that the statue, part of a deal to build a convention centre in Blantyre, celebrated Gandhi who they accused of having used racial slurs. ‘Being black people ourselves, such remarks have invited a sense of loathing and detestation of Gandhi,’ said the so-called Gandhi Must Fall group in their application which gave 18 grounds against the construction. Judge Michael Tembo ordered that work be suspended on the statue ‘until the hearing of the substantive matter’ or a court order to the contrary.