Catholic bishop slams Malawi civil service as disaster

Outspoken Karonga Catholic bishop Martin Mtumbuka has described the country’s civil service as a disaster, saying this is why public service delivery is poor.

Mtumbuka said this on Saturday during the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of Ludzi Girls Secondary School.

H said the Catholic church runs various schools in the country both basic, secondary and tertiary education whose teachers and other officials come from all over the world but said the government delays in providing them with work permits.

“It takes ages to provide them with work permits and this compromises the quality of education in our schools…the civil service is a disaster, absolute disaster. Unfortunately, we cannot bring back the hard working civil servants who were there during the Kamuzu days,” he said.

Government officials were conspicuously missing at the function as the relationship between the church and the DPP led government continues to widen.

Malawi Congress Party (MCP) president Lazarus Chakwera and United Transformation Movement (UTM) founding member Callista Mutharika were in attendance.

Bishop Mtumbuka had also no kind words for the government for abolishing tuition fees in secondary schools without consulting churches which run some schools.

Mtumbuka, who is also Education secretary for the powerful Catholic church, said this would compromise the quality of education in secondary schools including those run by the churches.

“They should increase grants in church run schools. The government should know that all the K90, 000 which the students pay go to buy their food and make their place of learning clean,” he said.

There was no immediate comment from the government.