Malawi’s Vice President Saulo Klaus Chilima and nine other people, including former first lady Sanile Djibiri, were killed when the military plane they were traveling in crashed, President Lazarus Tchakwera said.

The plane carrying Chilima, considered a possible candidate in next year’s presidential election, has been missing since yesterday, Monday.

“It is with great sadness that I inform you that it turned out to be a terrible tragedy. The search and rescue team located the aircraft near a hill. They found it completely destroyed with no survivors,” Chaquera said in a statement.

The plane had departed the capital Lilongwe at 09:17 local time (10:17 Greek time) on Monday, but was unable to land at Mzuzu airport as scheduled at 10:02 due to poor visibility.

He was ordered to return to the capital, but disappeared from radar and airport authorities were unable to contact him.

Chaquera said all those on board were killed on impact and that the army was taking their bodies back to the capital.

“Despite the history of the aircraft and the experience of the crew, something terribly went wrong with this aircraft on the return flight to Lilongwe, causing it to crash,” he said.

Pictures posted online show security and rescue personnel at the scene of the hillside crash with debris strewn around the tail of the Dornier 228-202K military transport aircraft, with its MAF registration number T03 still visible.

Reuters was unable to verify the authenticity of the images.

Chilima, 51, returned from South Korea on Sunday after attending the Korea-Africa summit and was traveling with the other passengers on Monday morning to attend the funeral of Malawi’s former justice minister in the north of the country .

“Dr. Saulo Klaus Chilima was a good man, a devoted father and husband, a citizen who loved his country and distinguished himself in the service of his country, and a distinguished vice president,” Chaquera said.

Chilima, a former director of Airtel Malawi, headed the United Party of Transformation. He partnered with Chaquera to form the ruling Tonse Alliance and was his running mate in the 2020 elections.

Relations between them, however, intensified ahead of the 2025 presidential election, in which the vice president was expected to contest the presidency against the current president.

Chilima was arrested in 2022 on corruption charges. But a Malawian court dropped the charges against him last month after the chief prosecutor filed a memo to drop the investigation. Chilima denied doing anything reprehensible.