BY TIMES EDITORIAL:<\/p>\n
Last week\u2019s revelation of massive plunder of public funds at the Malawi Police Service (MPS) has generated a myriad of reactions among Malawians.<\/p>\n
This is so because the leaked report from the Anti-Corruption Bureau has implicated big fish, including President Peter Mutharika and his ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).<\/p>\n
The latest to comment on the issue are civil society organisations which have given Mutharika 14 days to either resign or face impeachment.<\/p>\n
The leakage of the report comes at a critical point in Malawi with just less than a year to the May 2019 tripartite elections.<\/p>\n
Much as demanding the resignation of the President based on a preliminary report would be a harsh punishment to Mutharika, we believe the President and DPP owe Malawians a convincing explanation for dipping their fingers in the cookie jar.<\/p>\n
Malawians are eagerly waiting to hear from the President and DPP why they accepted a K145 million \u2018gift\u2019 from a supplier of food rations at MPS.<\/p>\n
The explanation by State House Press Secretary, Mgeme Kalilani, that a so-called young politician is leaking false information to discredit the President does not hold water.<\/p>\n
So, in the absence of such a convincing explanation, how would Mutharika and DPP face Malawians to vote for him again next year?<\/p>\n
For a long time, analysts have argued that one of the major reasons the country has failed to develop has been the involvement of leaders in stealing public resources.<\/p>\n
However, over the years, there has been lack of substantial evidence, including ACB reports, to pin the leaders to the theft claims.<\/p>\n
The leaked ACB investigation report, therefore, provides a fertile ground for the graft-bursting body to prove to Malawians that it is not a toothless bulldog Malawians perceive it to be.<\/p>\n
It is our hope that the ACB leadership will treat this matter with the prominence it deserves and get down to the root of the issue with urgency.<\/p>\n
We are encouraged by comments from ACB Director General, Reyneck Matemba, that the bureau will not relent in pursuing the matter.<\/p>\n
We pray that Matemba\u2019s comment is not a mere political statement aimed at blindfolding Malawians to believe that something is happening.<\/p>\n
ACB will never have another golden opportunity to show Malawians that it hates corruption and that it fears nobody.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BY TIMES EDITORIAL: Last week\u2019s revelation of massive plunder of public funds at the Malawi Police Service (MPS) has generated a myriad of reactions among Malawians. This is so because the leaked report from the Anti-Corruption Bureau has implicated big fish, including President Peter Mutharika and his ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). The latest to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":42927,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67860","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67860"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67860\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67862,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67860\/revisions\/67862"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}