Minister of Finance has increased the National Assembly budgetary vote by K1 billion after legislators had on Monday deferred the vote saying it was insufficient to enable committees of the House to carryout their oversight roles.
The National Assembly vote was initially allocated with K9. 410 billion and with the change the vote has increased to K10. 410 billion.
The House passed the vote with amendment of the K1 billion increment when Finance Minister, Goodall Gondwe announced the increment in the House which is continuing with Committee of Supply.
He said the additional money to the vote is a deduction from Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development vote which has also suffered another cut of K600 million going to the National Local Government Finance Committee vote.
This means Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development budget has suffered a cut of total sum of K1.6 billion. The vote which initially received a provision of K19, 240, 398, 888 now has a provision of K17, 640, 398, 888.
He said with the reduction, allocation to activities of iron sheets and Malata subsidy program are going to suffer.
On Thursday before the House was suspended for lunch break, it had passed three votes: National Assembly vote passed with amendment from provision of K9, 410, 180, 993 to now K10, 410, 180, 993; Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development passed with amendment from provision of K19, 240, 398, 888 to K17, 640, 398, 888 and; Malawi Police Service vote which has provision of K22, 963, 318, 076.
However, National Local Government Finance Committee vote which has a provision of K50. 890 billion has been deferred.
Members have deferred the vote because they want the Minister of Finance to increase the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) to K20 million per each constituency.
Before the vote was deferred, Opposition members defeated Finance Minister motion that the CDF be increased by K3 million from initial K12 million per each constituency. The opposition members successfully defeated the motion during the division voting which resulted opposition defending their stand with a whooping 71 votes against 49 votes from Government MPs. There were 70 Members of Parliament who were absent during the voting.
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