PAC mum on 7 rotten ministers: ‘Cleared’ Cashgate names still in K236bn files

The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament is non committal if it will name and shame seven serving cabinet ministers  implicated in the grand corruption scandal.

Malawians are yet to know individuals and businesses identified in the recent forensic audit on the country’s grand corruption  that established that about K236 billion in public funds could not be reconciliated between 2009 and December 31 2014.

PAC  vice-chairperson Kamlepo Kalua  had been vocal in demanding the dismissal of the said seven Cabinet ministers named in the forensic audit report.

Kalua, who is also Rumphi East Member of Parliament (People’s Party-PP) and PP third vice-president, said they still want names to be revealed.

But PAC chairperson Alekeni Menyani has said as they note of pulic anxiety, they are still waiting for Speaker of Parliament Richard Msowoya to authorise  the release of the names.

Menyani said his committee was still determined to get and release the names of those named in the report.

But President Peter Mutharika has claimed none of his Cabinet ministers are mentioned in the ‘grand corruption’ report.

“ There are no seven ministers, I asked Accountant General, Anti-Corruption Bureau [ACB] director, and there are no seven names,” said Mutharika.

Kalua on the other hand said they will not be interested to discuss names of companies which were already cleared by either the Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB) or Attorney General.

“We will however not tackle matters bordering on national security,” he said.

The audit was conducted by British firm RSM Risk Insurance LLP but Auditor General Stephenson Kamphasa  did not release the names owing to legal opinion received from Attorney General Kalekeni Kaphale.

According to the report, the audit found that K83.5 billion of the K236 billion which could not be accounted for was paid to 44 companies from the sample of 50 that the auditors selected to analyse.

The audit also found that billions were lost in overpayment of goods and services, duplicate payments and overpayment on shipping to wrong locations.

Initially, the amount suspected to have not been accounted for was pegged at K577 billion, according to a PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) data analysis released in May 2015.

However, the forensic audit established, through its testing of the system and controls, that the unreconciled funds could be in the region of K236 billion.

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