Malawi civil servants should perform or face sack – Daudi

A former high Malawi’s ranking civil servant Dr Andrew Daudi has warned government employees against a casual approach when discharging their duties.

Daud, who is currently Chief Executive Officer for Mallenium Challenge Project in Malawi but once worked as Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture, said civil servants should also be liable to dismissal for dismal performance.

Backing the President Peter Mutharika government’s Public Sector Reform Programme , Daudi,  who is also Chairperson for impeccable Malawi University of Science and Technology, said civil servants should not be immune to dismissal.

“Government’s efforts  now is also looking at performance because previously when you get a job in the civil service you are comfortable of having it up to  60 years. Whether they perform or not it doesn’t matter ,” Daud said during the launch of the MUST’s Performance Management handbook.

“That mentality must go. That’s why we are encouraging government to make sure that employees must perform because there are agreed plans, agreed targets which indicators on performance.

He said the reforms would help both the civil servants and the government to respect their mandate to improve the service.

“We agree to ensure so we did not implement those and if we didn’t achieve we have to know what’s the problem,” he said.

“Some people even if you advise them  it’s difficult for them to change that’s why must offer them  friendly warning, light warning and then  dismissals,” he said.

He said while people have negative perception on dismissals it also helps  the victims to become better after securing jobs.

“Dismissals are also a motivation because when you get another job you do it better because the other things have been corrected.  “

There has been a hot debate debate on the performance of Malawi’s servants in government department and orgnisation over the years.

This has  bee proved by the performance of once government owned entities after being privatsied.

However, the unsatisfatory performance is also attributed to lack of a resources, conducive environment and poor remuneration package for civil servants as compared to their counterparts in the private sector .