Coinage of Malawi

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In 1996, the 20 tambala coin also carried the portrait of the new president. Additionally, a 50 tambala coin was issued with his portrait. It was a new type, heptagonal in shape and produced by the Royal Mint (UK). It was made of brass-plated steel and showed the cat of arms on the reverse.

No coins showing the coat of arms on the obverse were released in 1996 or the few years afterwards. All now showed the portrait of the president.

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Yet another change occurred in 1996. The previous brass 1 kwacha coin featured a cockerel on the reverse. That political symbol was now replaced by a superb design of a fish eagle, which was again the work of Robert Elderton.

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Our forum member africancoins has more information about the coins of 1995 and 1996 on his web pages, here and here. He also mentions the fact that some designs show the initials of the designer, Paul Vincze, while others do not. Additionally, he discusses the different metal types used.

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In 2003 the 1, 2 and 5 tambala coins once more appeared with the coat of arms obverse. The 20 and  50 tambala coins and the 1 kwacha coin for that year still retained the presidential portrait, however.

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In 2004, of all the coins only the 50 tambala was issued with the presidential portrait. Surprisingly, a new 50 tambala type was also issued, that showed the coat of arms on the obverse but an attractive new design of a zebra and foal on the reverse. The new coin was produced at the Royal Mint (UK), but the surviving records do not show who designed the reverse.

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Because of increasing inflation, Malawi issued two superb new bimetallic circulation coins in 2006: 5 kwacha and 10 kwacha. The reverse design of the 5 kwacha coin shows fishermen hauling in fish in their nets.

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The reverse design of the 10 kwacha coin features a tea plantation worker.

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Above is one of a series of silver 5 kwacha coins produced for collectors by the Royal Mint. The whole series was designed by Michael Hibbit. Notice how similar the design above looks to that of the 5 kwacha coin of 2006. And in fact, Mr Hibbit did indeed design the 5 and 10 kwacha of 2006.

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Malawi issued three new circulation coins in 2012. They were new versions of the 1, 5 and 10 kwacha coins. Thse coins were small and light and made of stainless-steel-plated iron. Their designs had already been seen on older coins.

The Royal mint produced the 2012 coins, which is not surprising, since one of them is a heptagon.

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So that brings the story up to date.

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When Malawi went decimal, the corn cob on the shilling and the elephants on the florin were transferred to the 10 tambala and 20 tambala respectively. This made sense, because a shilling was equal to 10 tambala in value, therefore a florin was equivalent to 20 tambala.

Curiously, the cockerel on the six pence was not transferred to its decimal equivalent, the 5 tambala, which was occupied by a  purple heron instead. However, the cockerel ended up on the lowly bronze 1 tambala. Logic would have suggested that the new 1 tambala denomination was given to the new design of the heron, while the cockerel remained on the 5 tambala, but this was not the case.


The transfer of designs from predecimal sterling coinages to decimal coinages is an interesting story in itself. To read more about it, see:

The pound: predecimal to decimal design continuity

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When I was posting this topic, I thought I had also seen this bird, the purple heron (above), on a South African coin design.




In fact, the bird on the South African 5 cents was a blue crane.

See: Second Coinage of the Republic of South Africa.