Malawi’s President Professor Peter Mutharika on 30th November, 2015 addressed a Parliamentary Committees in London, United Kingdom (UK) where he managed to layout some of the major developments his Government has done in a bid to make Malawi marketable to investors.
In the Speech, the President also outlined some major reforms his Government is implementing to bring back the lost trust that development partners had.
“Honorable members, let me confess that after my Government, led by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) came to power on 20, may 2014, our joy and cerebration was short lived because we were jolted by a painful shock, when it dawned on us that, our long established development partners, including the UK, had suspended direct budget support to our country as a reaction to the massive looting of public funds by some civil servants, colluding with other suspects, to defraud Government of huge sums of money, popularly known as CashGate Scandal.
“This suspension of direct budget support, therefore translated into an immediate cut of the support to Malawi’s budget by over 40 percent, which for a country like ours is a very big cut to the country’s budgetary requirements,” explained Mutharika.
According to Mutharika this is the reason his Government has set up strict measures to restore discipline in financial management and win back the donors trust.
He highlighted that his Government managed to come up with a cabinet size of only 20 Ministers, reducing of fleet of Ministerial vehicles, embarked on a wide range of public sector more efficient and effective and introduction of radical reforms aimed at correcting all the ills that were there in the past that led to loopholes in the system, which were exploited by those involved in the cashgate scandal.
He added “We have since sealed all the loopholes in the system and no further siphoning of public resources is taking place, and will never happen again. We are also pursuing all the suspects involved in the looting of the public funds and are all being brought before courts and so far, Government has won all the cases.”
President Mutharika said the wide range of public sector reform is aimed at making the public sector more efficient and effective and to make the country’s fate into our own hands by opening up Malawi for business.
He further added that in June this year, the country organised an Investment Forum with the aim of attracting and retaining investors.
President Mutharika also assured the UK August House that there are a lot of benefits in investing in Malawi, which included Governments commitment to ensuring business friendly economic environment, Political stability (No history of civil war) and provision of necessary security for investment, life and property.mana
