President Bingu wa Mutharika 'dead'

President Bingu wa Mutharika of Malawi has died, doctors and cabinet ministers have told the BBC, but this has not been officially announced.

One of the doctors who treated Mr Mutharika, 78, said the president was "clinically dead" on Thursday after suffering a cardiac arrest. State media are still reporting that he has been flown to South Africa for medical treatment.

If confirmed, his death would spark a constitutional crisis, analysts say.

According to the constitution, the vice-president takes over if the head of state is incapacitated or dies in office. But Vice-President Joyce Banda and Mr Mutharika fell out after a row over the succession in 2010, and she was expelled from the ruling Democratic People's Party (DPP). Mr Mutharika's brother, Foreign Minister Peter Mutharika, was chosen instead of Ms Banda to be the DPP's presidential candidate in the 2014 elections. He has been standing in for the president when needed during official occasions. Ms Banda recently told the BBC she had not spoken to Bingu wa Mutharika for more than a year.