Population: 12.9 million (6.9 million under 18)
Government Armed Forces: 5,300
Compulsary Recruitment Age: no conscription
Voluntary Recruitment Age: 18
Voting Age: 18
Optional Protocol: signed 7 September 2000
Other Treaties: GC AP I, GC AP II, CRC, ILO 138, ILO 182, ACRWC, ICC

There were no reports of under-18s in the armed forces.

Government:

National recruitment legislation and practice

A new Defence Force Act came into force in September 2004, replacing the earlier Army Act and incorporating amendments proposed by the Malawi Law Commission which removed any possibility of under-18s serving in the Defence Force (previously the Malawi Army). The Act provided that the Defence Force had three components: the regular Defence Force, the Defence Force reserve and the militia. The militia was defined as comprising persons other than members of the regular force or reserve forces trained for military purposes and called to serve only in emergencies. No person under the age of 18 could be recruited to or be members of any of these forces.1 While the academic qualifications of recruits were checked with the aim of ensuring that no under-18s were recruited,2 lack of a birth registration system meant that the age of recruits could not be definitively verified.3

Under-18s could previously apply to be recruited with the consent of a parent or legal guardian or, when the parents or guardian were dead or unknown, with the consent of the chairman of the local court of the area in which they resided.4

There was no conscription,5 but the National Service Act provided that in case of a public emergency every citizen between the ages of 18 and 60 could be called for national service.6 In a letter to the Child Soldiers Coalition, the Malawi High Commission stated that the National Service Act did not exist; other sources stated that the Act remained in force as it had been neither declared unconstitutional nor repealed by an act of parliament.7

In June 2004 the government reported to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women that since 1999 the policy of the Ministry of Defence had been to recruit women in the armed forces. By 2004, 130 women had been trained.8

1 Confidential sources, Malawi, August 2007.

2 Information provided by the Malawi High Commission, August 2007.

3 UNICEF, Draft Country Programme Document for Malawi.

4 Confidential sources, above note 1.

5 Malawi High Commission, above note 2.

6 Confidential sources, above note 1.

7 Malawi High Commission, above note 2; confidential sources, above note 1.

8 Combined second, third, fourth and fifth periodic reports of Malawi to the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, UN Doc. CEDAW/C/MWI/2-5, 28 June 2004.

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