Bingu wa Mutharika

==Chairman of the African Union==
On 31 January 2010, Mutharika replaced [[Muammar al-Gaddafi]] as chairman of the [[African Union]] after Gaddafi's attempt to run as the African Union chairman for an additional year failed. Mutharika was Malawi's first head of state to assume the position of chairman.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.maravipost.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2405:only-bingu-for-au-chair-banda&catid=54:politics&Itemid=124 |title=Only Bingu for AU chair—Banda |access-date=16 December 2010 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110714033345/http://www.maravipost.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2405%3Aonly-bingu-for-au-chair-banda&catid=54%3Apolitics&Itemid=124 |archive-date=14 July 2011  }}. maravipost.com (27 January 2010)</ref> In his acceptance speech he said that "Africa is not a poor continent, but the African population are poor" and called for "Africa to develop Africa". He shared his vision for the African Food Basket Initiative by making food security a priority in his agenda.

[[File:Group photo of the 2010 G-20 Toronto summit family photo.jpg|right|thumb|G20 summit]]
On 4 April he attended the 50th anniversary in celebration of Senegalese independence as the African Union chairman. He also attended the [[G8 summit]] in Canada and the [[G20 summit]] in [[Seoul]], South Korea.<ref name=nationmw.net>{{cite news|last=Sonani |first=Bright |title=The year Bingu assumed AU chairmanship |url=http://www.mwnation.com/index.php/national-news/11966-the-year-bingu-assumed-au-chairmanship.html |newspaper=Nation on Sunday |date=30 December 2010 }}{{dead link|date=November 2016 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

On 26 July, he attended the African Union summit in [[Kampala]], Uganda,<ref name="nationmw.net"/> where he condemned the [[International Criminal Court]] (ICC) for issuing a warrant to arrest [[Omar al Bashir]] because it undermined African authority.<ref name="nationmw.net"/> They adopted the African Food Basket Initiative here which was presented to the UN on 29 September.<ref name="nationmw.net"/> On 6 September, he attended the inauguration of Rwandan President [[Paul Kagame]].<ref name="nationmw.net"/> He attended the Iran-Africa Conference, which aimed at strengthening ties between Iran and African countries.<ref name="nationmw.net"/> During a speech at Boston University, Mutharika defended his subsidy program and noted that although Western countries say African governments should not subsidise agriculture, Western governments subsidise their own farmers.<ref name="nationmw.net"/> Malawi hosted Africa's first conference that brought together Ministers of Agriculture in Africa where they were urged to fight for subsidies in agriculture.<ref name="nationmw.net"/> He did not attend the Africa-EU Trade summit in Libya but no official reason was provided for this move.<ref name="nationmw.net"/> During his tenure, he joined international calls for [[Laurent Gbagbo]] to accept defeat following the [[2010 Ivorian presidential election]].<ref name="nationmw.net"/>