The Malawi Electoral Commission (Mec) has lost hope on prospect of recovering about K700 million it invested in Capital Alliance, a firm which is undergoing liquidation processes.
Chifundo Kachele Mec Chairperson said that the electoral body has learnt a lesson on the importance of following procedures when investing public resources in future operations.
Kachale said the decision was made by members of a past commission, revealed that Parliament keeps on pushing them to recover the money, which keeps on appearing despite being stuck outside Mec’s kitty.
Mec has, for now, no proper answer to the question of whether there is potential to recover the money “said Kachele.
He added that they are only waiting on the regulator, namely the Reserve Bank of Malawi, to help recover the money through assets. As of now, they have not been told by the regulator if the company had assets which may be sold so that they can recover the money.
He concluded that now thy have learnt a lesson that whenever they want to use money which belongs to Malawians, they should be following proper procedures. This investment was made (while) thinking that Malawians would benefit from the money but, looking at current situation, they don’t think Malawians will benefit from the investment.
Public Accounts Committee of Parliament Chairperson Mark Botoman has described the development as frustrating.
“Otherwise, Parliament has not been silent on the issue as it constituted a joint committee of four committees to follow up on the matter.
Botoman said Malawians might recall that the Speaker (of Parliament Catherine Gotani Hara) instituted a joint committee of four oversight committes of Parliamrnt to llok into issues surrounding Capital Alliance. Now that Parliament has risen, he believe that secretariat (of parliament) will speed up the process of ensuring that the mandate of this joint committee is met as matter of urgency.
Boniface Chibwana, Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace National Coordinator described the development as worrisome.
He said public resources need to be safeguarded otherwise, Mec should not lose hope but find other ways of ensuring that they recover the money.
Chibwana said the decision to invest was good but they cannot afford to lose the money and left Mec push and recover the money.
Kachale in another development said commission is comfortable with candidate nomination fees that are prevailing at the moment.
Despite that the local unit, the Kwacha, has been devalued by over 75 percent since June 23 2020, when Malawians voted for president in the court –ordered election.
In the 2019 tripartite elections – which saw Malawians voting for ward councilors, members of Parliament and President- presidential candidates paid K2 million while those vying for parliamentary seats paid K 500,000 for males and K 250,000 for females.
Kachale, however, said, should there be a need, the issue of reviewing the fees cannot be thrown out of the equation.
Source:Times
