The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation has collected K40 million after the commercialisation of Very Important Persons (VIP) lounges at the country’s airports in July 2016.
The ministry’s spokesperson, Rejoice Shumba, said the collections are not steady.
“On a day when we record a lot of users, almost K500, 000 is collected. On a bad day, a maximum of K100, 000 is collected,” Shumba said.
Malawi commercialised the VIP lounges at Chileka and Kamuzu International airports as part of the public reforms programme.
“VIP lounges are provided at a fee and services have improved. It is expected therefore that, as the VIPs become self-sustaining, financing improvements in the services will also be achieved. It [the system] was also changed to allow other categories of the citizenry to access VIP facilities,” she said.
Shumba said in the past, before commercialisation, the services were available to designated VIPs in society. Following the move to commercialise the facilities, other users have access to the facilities at a fee.
However, the mode of payment for accessing the VIP facilities has been on cash basis.
According to the ministry, this is because its bank account was not ready and the revenue collected was being deposited in a separate account.
According to a press statement published in the media recently, the ministry has worked on the challenge and would-be users are asked to pay through the account 72 hours before the date of travel and a Government Receipt (GR) is issued once proof of payment is verified with the bank.
“The GR will be presented at the VIP Lounge in order to access the facility. Failure to produce a deposit slip will result into being denied access to the facility,” reads the statement in part.
VIP access fee is pegged K50, 000 per user, per single use, for Category B and K100, 000 per use, per single use, for Category C.
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