PP Wants House To Approve Appointees Dismisals

Uladi

Peoples Party (PP) says Parliament must approve dismissal of all officers serving in positions that require Parliament approval when appointed by Presidet, in order to protect them from politically motivated firings.

The comment comes from the wake of President Mutharika’s statement that some officers in foreign missions will be recalled and replaced by new ones.

President Peter Mutharika in his state of Nation Address informed the House that during the 2016/17 fiscal year, Government plans to rationalize its foreign missions in order to make them lean and efficient with the right numbers of personnel with requisite competences. He then mentioned that Government will also recall individuals who, in some cases have stayed in these missions for up to 10 or 15 years.

However, PP acting President Uladi Mussa reacted that this is very unfortunate because Government wants to replace officers with their own party supporters or relatives.

“Mr. Speaker Sir, we in the PP continue to wonder whether it is necessary to recall everybody from our various embassies outside, just because we want to replace them with relatives of DPP supporters.” he said when presenting PP's response to the State of Nation Address

“It is very unfortunate, Malawi is one Mr. Speaker Sir. Malawi is one." He repeated "And no culture and no tribe is superior to another culture and tribe in this country.”

Later in an interview said this is a tendency which is costing Government alot of money and it must stop.

Mussa then suggested that the Parliamentary Committee on Appointment needs to check on this issue and must have a say whenever the Ambassadors and High Commissioners are being recalled.

“We need to find out” he said “because we are only interested in entry point but when they are exiting parliament has shown lack of interest.” he observed

“Even other appointments of positions like Inspector General of Police. They are approved here but when it comes to firing we seem not to be concerned so these are issue that we need to look at. We have to consider both hiring and firing”