It is only, perhaps, a whole-system-cleansing of some kind, agogo, that can bring or add value to the seeds of democratic governance sown in 1993 and allow the citizenry to confront their ‘ghosts of impotence’ and regain their rightful place as their own watchdog of their affairs and destiny.
Despite its considerable resource endowment, Malawi continues to barely subsist at the periphery of the global economy and cling to the margins of general world affairs.
To be honest, agogo, much of Malawi today is so plagued by misery that it is clear the country is treading on a deep undercurrent of popular discontent and latent political instability lurking beneath a façade of fear-induced calm.
And bottomless corruption and lack of proper policy direction – as evidenced by the insistence by some stakeholders on the nonprocedural implementation of the Lilongwe Water Board’s (LWB) Salima-Lilongwe Water Project awarded to Khato Civils Pty Limited – are some of the reasons driving the majority of Malawians into the quagmire of widespread misery, worsening deprivation and deepening despair.
Frankly, the new democratic dispensation in Malawi brought a lot of hope to many ordinary citizens who were convinced that their economic fortunes would be actualised. The thinking then was that in a more freer and transparent political environment economic benefits would be an obvious byproduct.
But with the advent of ‘theftocracy’ under the veneer of democracy things have really changed.
Ex c e s s i v e g r e e d h a s progressively brought this country down to its knees.
Equally eroded in the foundation of sustainable national development are values of honesty, hard work and discipline. Progressively these have largely been replaced by a culture of laziness, begging and sheer theft of public resources both by the elected officials and some members of the civil service.
But the majority of ordinary citizens are becoming more and more poorer in the current democratic environment than they were under autocratic regimes.
Simply put, agogo, mere survival has become a daily struggle for the majority of Malawians afflicted by poverty and hunger, succumbing to preventable diseases and vulnerable to premature death and insecurity.
One important institution contributing to such people’s misery is our do-nothing-of-substance Parliament that accepts any ‘nonsense’ thrown its way by the Executive as if it had no public powers of its own under the Constitution of discerning what is good from what is bad for its larger constituency – the citizenry.
The functions, powers and duties it ignores most – of providing checks and balances and close scrutiny of all executive actions (decisions and conduct) – that they comply with the rule of law (legislation Parliament itself crafts) through its many specialised parliamentary committees – are the ones that would most manifestly attest to its relevance, further the values in the laws it enacts and proudly show the works of its hands.
But by chance the Public Accounts Committee (Pac) of Parliament has strongly spoken against the current form of the Salima-Lilongwe Water Project, demanding that an independent cost estimate should be undertaken before it proceeds.
Indeed, the project worth about one-third of the national budget cannot afford to cut corners by bypassing relevant procedures as Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA) and feasibility study.
I repeat, agogo, it has been upheld both in governance and ethics – and Khako Civils and South Zambezi Chairperson Simbi Phiri should know better about it – that any project of such magnitude as the Salima-Lilongwe Water Project must go thorough and transparent processes including proper tendering, feasibility study and ESIA before the contractor would even start anything.
From tendering to implementation, the project, precisely – regardless of LWB Chief Executive Officer Alfonso Chikuni’s infantile arguments – smells of filth and Pac is justified to say that it must be probed by the Anti-Corruption Bureau.
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