Malawians have asked government to reconsider the decision to lock down the country, saying people will die of hunger.

President Peter Mutharika’s administration on Tuesday announced a lockdown which Mutharika said will start on April 18 and end May 9.

Malawians faulted government for instituting a lockdown without providing ways in which people will get food.

“Lockdown goes hand in hand with hunger management. Rich countries are on lockdown but continue giving their people food and personal protective equipment,” said Charlie Bonosali Chilowa.

While Jaika MW said: “To say the truth this lockdown is for their own reasons not for Covid-19 prevention. How can they announce lockdown without well planned measures to help many people who depend on maganyu (piece work) to feed their families in everyday life in this poor economically country?”

Andrea Soko chipped in: Tifa ndi njala, (We will die of hunger). We are not among developed countries so the government cannot give us food… The decisions are made by the millionaires; they don’t consider us the poor.”

In an interview, Alex Munthali in Mzuzu said lockdown cannot work in Malawi due to the way many people earn their income.

“Many Malawian can’t afford to have money that can be used to feed them for up to 21 days, imagine we are in the system of hand to mouth, so with this nature how can one survive, we are asking Government to reverse this,” said Munthali.

On her part, Juliet Mayicha from Kasungu said the country is not ready for a lockdown. She added that other countries, such as Zambia also have cases but the governments there have not locked down the countries.

Malawi has recorded 16 coronavirus cases and two deaths. Across the world, cases have passed two million while over 129,000 deaths have been registered. More than 508,000 people have also recovered from the coronavirus across the world.