The Malawi Police Service (MPS) says it will do everything within its mandate to ensure refugees and asylum seekers that are relocating to Dzaleka Refugees Camp are well protected. 

The assurance follows government’s move on proceeding with relocating asylum seekers and refugees to the Camp in Dowa by November 20, 2022, and February 1, 2023, respectively.

But speaking to YFM Online, the MPS’s Director of Research and Planning Unit Happy Mkandawire said police is collaborating with other institutions like the Department of Immigration and Citizenship Services to make sure that the exercise is done smoothly.

He said: “The process is being managed very well, the police as an organisation that provide safety, we have our role to play in this relocation exercise and we are coordinating with our colleagues from the office of immigration and refugees.”

Mkandawire has however cautioned Malawians desist from taking the law into their own hands in course of the exercise.

“We are also sensitising members of the general public to stay in harmony with the refugees and they should leave the relocation exercise to police to handle,” Mkandawire said.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Homeland Security has disclosed that it would carry out a verification exercise next month to find out the actual number of the refugees and asylum seekers.

“We do monitor them on daily basis in the Camp and we I like to indicate that we are going to have a verification exercise starting October.

“This exercise allows us as a department to make sure that we know who is still within the land, so we call each and every individual as a refugee or asylum seeker,” said Ivy Chihana, Senior Legal Advisor in the office of Commissioner for Refugees and the Refugee Status Determination Supervisor.