Malawi's President Joyce Banda has announced her intention to repeal a number of laws that have made Malawi into a pariah state, from its ban on homosexuality to broad police powers of search and arrest, to a law that allows cabinet ministers to shut down newspapers.

Announced in Parliament on Friday, the planned repeals come at a time when Malawi – an impoverished state of 14 million, half of whom live on less than a dollar a day – is seeking to reestablish links with Western donor nations that were severed during the tempestuous final years of the late Malawian President Bingu wa Mutharika.