|
|
|
|
| National |
| ‘Corruption worse in Malawi’ |
|
by
Mc Donald Chapalapata, 11 March 2003
|
High levels of corruption and lack of political will to combat corruption are some of the major obstacles for the slow economic growth in the country, a World Bank report on Malawi Country Economic Memorandum has observed.
The report, presented by the bank’s lead economist for Africa Sudhir Chitali and discussed by government officials, members of the private sector and representatives of the donor community at a meeting in Lilongwe on Friday, says there is evidence that the extent of corruption has worsened since 1999.
“Malawi has a reasonable institutional and legal infrastructure for addressing corruption through public education, prevention and enforcement. These institutions, however, suffer from lack of political support, low budgetary resources and a weak court system for effective prosecution of high profile cases,” reads the report in part.
The report also says recent high profile cases suggest high levels of
corruption in the areas of public procurement, management of parastatals, education spending, and land as well as provision of public services like police and immigration.
“More recently, corruption problems have come to light in the context of
non-transparent operations related to maize sales,” reads the report.
The World Bank suggests that the whole process of investigation and prosecution
of corruption cases be strengthened by garnering greater political support, better training and more resources for the Anti-Corruption Bureau and the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions.
“Government needs to bring about greater transparency in the use of public money with improved public procurement processes, better expenditure control and clarification of responsibilities for budget execution between the minister and the permanent secretary in the context of a comprehensive civil service reform,” the bank suggests.
The report says another reason why there is slow economic growth in the country is the HIV/Aids scourge in which nearly 95 percent of the infected people are economically active adults in the 15-49 age group.
It also observed that there are unpredictable demands by parastatals, resulting from their poor financial performance, forcing government to sort out their debts.
“For instance, in 2001 government was obliged to take on and service an NFRA debt of MK1 billion amounting to 1 percent of the Gross Domestic Product and pay off an Admarc loan guarantee and various other domestic liabilities amounting to nearly 1.75 percent of GDP,” says the bank.
Governor of the Reserve Bank of Malawi Elias Ngalande, who opened the workshop on behalf of Finance Minister Friday Jumbe, said in an interview
the issues raised in the report are not new.
“But the problem lies with the implementation of the policies. We do not implement them because of several factors like the HIV/Aids pandemic which is claiming a lot of human resource and other natural disasters where manpower is diverted to these areas instead of concentrating on the implementation of the policies,” he said.
Ngalande said the bank’s findings and recommendations would provide useful input into the annual review of the Malawi Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (MPRSP) planned for April.
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
