20 Malawi MPs face prosecution over abuse of constituency funds: Arrests could start after House adjourns Friday
About 20 Members of Parliament risk being arrested and prosecuted for allegedly mismanaging Constituendcy Development Fund (CDF), if an internal audit report quoted by Minister of Finance, Economic Planning and Development Goodall Gondwe is anything to go by.
According to Gondwe, about K80 million is missing from the K3 billion allocated to 16 districts under the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) and District Development Fund (DDF).
He said there are “at least 20 MPs” who are suspected to have mismanaged the CDF in their respective constituencies.
Gondwe, said government would like the suspects to be “brought to book” and that the law will take its course .
MPs held Finance Minister to ransom when passing the 2017/18 National Budget in the National Assembly in Lilongwe by forcing him to raise the CDF from K18 million to K23 million per constituency.
Gondwe told Parliament that a systematic audit of 16 councils was carried out which found that mismanagement of funds in CDF and DDF had occurred and millions of kwacha did not go into development projects as planned.
He said most of the resources, money contributed by Malawians in form of punitive taxes, were abused.
Gondwe said: “In both of these, out of the K3 billion, an amount of over K80 million was misused and where it was used properly, the structures created such as school classrooms, bridges and roads were grossly of substandard and grossly unattractive so that within a short time we will need to create replacements of these structures.”
The Finance Minister emphasised the need to examine the use of resources for grass roots economic development channelled through DDF and CDF as well as Local Development Fund (LDF).
The excerpt from the audit carried out last year which Gondwe read out indicated that MPs were the ones sourcing quotations instead of procurement departments in councils.
The audit also found that such interference was contributing to the creation of ghost projects and materials not being delivered at project sites.
Reads the excerpt in part: “In some cases, the goods and materials were procured from suppliers that were related to the honourable members of Parliament.
“In addition, many projects were initiated by the honourable members of Parliament only without the involvement of their area development committees.”
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I wait for Friday evening to hear the names of MP’s who are thief’s and see them arrested.
This nis mood development. Arrest them please and one of them is Rachel Mazombwe Zulu of Mchinji North who is using the CDF for promoting campaign for her brother in Mchinji East constituency instead of using the money for the benefit of people of Mchinji North constituency where she is a member of parliament. Please ttrack such MPs and bring them to book. No development at all because of theft of this kind. Another one is Noel Masangwi, Patricia Kaliati and her husband and also Gowelo and many more others. Please arrest them now so that others can learn from… Read more »
The Minister of Finance must confess he also misused CDF with Sanga Regional Governor for DPP North. We have reports of you Minister, you will regret we know CDF in Mzimba North was used as your pocket money. Chaponda at Peter and you Goodal should be first culprit brought to book. Auditors General useless and stupid man why are you failing to take action of ROTTEN CABINET. Don’t blind us you will all be smocked out. This means that we will call for elections DPP is corrupt all MPs and Ministers and Executive including ACB paulendo. We will rise against… Read more »
Malawi will never get any where in development with the culture that has become of Malawian politicians and civil servants. We have become the laughing stock of Africa and the world. Th MPs were asking for increase in the CDF and DDF funds so that they can continue to steal big time. Ndiponso awa si Mapoliticians they are opportunists who are there to plunder the resources of the country. Malawians , come 2018 we should vote carefully.
Amangidwe basi akuzolowera. Akuti ndikuthandizani ndi ndalama zanga pomwe zili zathu zomwe za CDF.
Nothing is going to happen here. Waste of time even discussing it. This is Malawi.
The Treasury has to put strong measures. These MPs need to be producing Bill of Quantities of their projects.
The treasury do tell Departments to cost their activities if they need funding why do the same treasury just issue such an amount which is very huge without a BQ. . Amangidwe basi, Zinazo do not give them unless they produce a BQ
Goodal is very much right here but are we sure its only the MPs in that house eating and misusing the money olo zayambila patali….?
My guess is that it will another 20 years before we know who they are!
Hi Goodall,
It seems you’re in the right course, You are the type of characters we want in our government. People
with a political will to completely uproot corruption and falsehood, a commendable commitment towards developing our economically ill country. After breaking the news of these unscrupulous MPs, the next thing we expect is to see their names published or announced in the local media, and a legal action to be taken to reprimand every culprit regardless of their party affiliations. They are no longer honorable but rather mere villains. *bravo Goodall*