The Office of the Ombudsman has broadened its scope in probing the questionable selling of smallholder farmers’ tractors with the latest inclusion of the Ministry of Finance, Economic Development and Planning, other government departments and connected individuals.
Ombudsman Martha Chizuma-Mwangonde confirmed to have finally received information from the Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development saying the information provided led the investigation to other Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs).
“For example we wrote MoF [Ministry of Finance] and them too have also provided us with required documentation. The investigators from my office have also talked to a some MDAs in Lilongwe connected to the investigation and will in the next two weeks go around the country to have a discussion with other identified MDAs and individuals connected to the investigation,” Chizuma said.
She said this is an ongoing investigation and depending on what the office gets along the way there may be need to get further clarification from the MDAs they have already spoken to.
“All things being equal we are hoping by end of July or first week of August we should have finished the process and produced our report inclusive of any remedial action if need be,” she said.
On May 10 this year, the office of the Ombudsman ordered the Ministry of Agriculture to explain how the machinery which the government bought using a 2011 Parliament approved $55 million loan facility from the Export-Import Bank of India for smallholder farmers were disposed off.
The action was in direct response to complaints of the tractors not reaching the intended beneficiaries.
The government is said to have duped Malawians as it sold the equipment, at a loss, to top government officials and affluent private players leaving the taxpayer to clear the loan and the interest.
Towards the end of last year, the matter came to the fore when People’s Party parliamentarian for Rumphi East, Kamlepo Kalua, demanded to know the whereabouts of the 144 maize shellers and 177 tractors and their components.
Former minister of agriculture, All an Chiyembekeza, confirmed in Parliament that some top government officials, including Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Minister Francis Kasaila, Speaker of Parliament Richard Msowoya and private firms such as Mulli Brothers Holdings Limited had benefited from the sale of the tractors.
Kalua claimed government had dubiously sold tractors at about K5 million each to top government officials despite buying them at K37 million each.
But a Senior Director in the Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development, Bright Kumwembe, while acknowledging that the tractors were sold at a cost price to these top officials, which means government would not get any profits from the sale, dismissed reports to the effect that the tractors were bought at K37 million each.
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