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| National |
| House meets for 30 minutes |
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by
Gedion Munthali, 11 March 2004
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18:29:39
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Parliament adjourned on Thursday after meeting for only 30 minutes but the members of Parliament still got their full allowances for the day.
The Economics Association of Malawi (Ecama) and Public Affairs Committee (Pac) described the development as unfortunate and childish, saying it represented lack of seriousness by government.
First Deputy Speaker Loveness Gondwe adjourned the House too soon after deputy leader of the House Kaliyoma Phumisa said government business could not start before inter party consultations.
So in essence the House only convened on Thursday to listen to Gondwe read out the morning prayer, names of the new cabinet ministers and bills that President Bakili Muluzi has assented to before breaking for the day despite four bills appearing on the agenda.
“Madam deputy speaker, since we will be meeting here up to March 17th, or go up to 19th if we do not finish our business, I wish to propose that consultations take place on how we should proceed,” was Phumisa’s response when called upon to roll out business of the day.
“I would, therefore, like to propose that the House adjourns up to 2 o’clock this afternoon to enable the business committee of the House to meet and discuss the way forward,” added Phumisa.
Meanwhile Gondwe was seen consulting with deputy clerk Stanslas Chisanu as some opposition members and some members of the general public sitting in the public gallery looked startled.
“It appears there will be many things to discuss, so could you guide us on the length of the adjournment,” Gondwe sought Phumisa’s indulgence.
“I agree that there is a lot to discuss, including the supplementary budget which is coming on Monday. I think I should amend my proposal. Let the House be adjourned until tomorrow,” proposed Phumisa and Gondwe obliged. End of the day’s sitting.
“This is terrible and awful,” reacted Rumphi North MP Ian Mkandawire (Aford) in an interview. “How can they just bring us here and turn us into a bunch of tourists? We cannot just come here to look at this building and drive around Lilongwe. That’s tourism.”
Mkandawire wondered why the business committee did not meet earlier to line up issues for discussion.
Karonga North West MP Green Mwamondwe described the development as unfortunate and embraced the public out cry about financial squander on legislators.
“We have not discussed anything today, yet we will be paid our allowances. This is unfortunate. Calling Parliament is expensive,” grieved Mwamondwe. “This public is right to complain that money is being wasted on allowances.”
MPs get a daily subsistence allowance of K6,000 ($56) each when the House is meeting.
“How could they invite MPs to come here when they were not ready,” he queried.
Ecama spokesman Perks Ligoya wondered why the same government that called for the sitting was not ready.
“That is pure childishness. How can public resources be misused like that? MPs are paid for doing something, they are not paid for just staying in Lilongwe,” lamented Ligoya. “And why waste time like that when there are so many outstanding issues?”
Pac chair Boniface Tamani wished the civil society in Malawi was “very strong” to take government to task.
“They cannot just play around with money like that when people are suffering,” charged Tamani. “This shows government is not serious.”
Phumisa did not explain why none of the four bills on Thursday’s order paper (official agenda of the national assembly) could not be discussed.
Three of the bills – Electoral Commission (Amendment); Parliamentary and Presidential Elections (Amendment) and Constitution (Amendment) have been brought forward from the November – December 2003 sitting.
Tamani said all these bills be rejected “because this is not the time we should be talking about passing elections related legislation especially when such proposed laws were once rejected.”
The Corrupt Practices (Amendment) Bill will only be discussed once the legal affairs committee reports back to the House.
Committee chair Abdullah Mdalla said his committee is meeting again next week to try to finalise consultations on the matter.
The electoral commission bill is seeking to empower the Electoral Commission to summon “any person and demand any documents, returns, records and any other thing in his possession which the commission deemed necessary and appropriate to its inquiry.”
It also proposes to empower the commission to determine conditions of service for the Chief Elections Officer. Currently he is appointed under the commission’s Act to a renewable term of five years.
The opposition rejected the bill when it was last introduced in the House, citing “a lot of ambiguities”.
The bill on elections seeks, among other things, to extend the period for publishing results in the gazette from eight days to within 30 days and also reduce political party representatives at a registration centre to not more than two people.
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