Deputy Speaker of the Malawi National Assembly, Esther Mcheka Chilenje on Wednesday evening adjourned the House earlier than agreed time citing health grounds as taps runs dry at the Parliament.
The adjournment that happened at 18:44 hours left Leader of House, George Chaponda and his fellow cabinet ministers gob smacked as it happened just after Government had successfully won the motion to extend the sitting time for the Committee of Supply to last night hours.
The House is in the third day of Government business of considering and passing budgetary votes allocated to various Government Ministries and Departments.
Dedza East legislator, Juliana Lunguzi who insistently stood in the House and was recognised to speak on Point of Order, informed the Deputy Speaker, Esther Mcheka Chilenje that "all toilets in the building were in bad shape" as there has been no water since morning.
"Can we please adjourn the House because it is health hazard" she pleaded
Deputy Speaker, Esther Mcheka Chilenje sustained the point of order and agreed with the member that it was hazardous to continue keeping members in the House which has no water and has dry toilets.
"Toilets indeed are in bad shape." She agreed, "It is a very big big health hazard and members of Parliament cannot be kept in such environment"
"As your chair, I cannot allow members continue to deliberate in this condition. I plead with Government that we need to adjourn the House today so that members can go home and will continue with business tomorrow when possibly water is back. Because even the Minister of Health can agree with me that this is health hazard and it is very unfair" said Chilenje
But, Minister of Information, Communication Technology and Civic Education, Patricia Kaliati stood on Point of Order to protest against Deputy Speaker's plea.
She reacted by describing the plea as "sabotage" from Speaker's office and added that the duty of ensuring that there is water in the House belongs to the Speakers office who runs the affairs of Parliament and therefore the deputy speaker was supposed to solve the problem and not to bring it in the House.
"You needed to have plan B as to how you are going to handle the water problem here at your office." Added Kaliati
However deputy speaker ruled the Minister Out of Order "This issue is beyond office of the Speaker. The problem of water is not only affecting Parliament building, even in our houses we have this problem"
Leader of House, George Chaponda who felt being let down by the Deputy Speakers plea, he went on stood to ask for adjournment but echoed Kaliati remarks that the water problem issue was supposed to be handled by speakers office and it should have not affected the deliberations of the House.
The National Assembly in Committee of Supply stage where the committee of the whole house is considering and passing each budget vote allocated to Government departments and Ministries. There are 57 votes in total but the House on Wednesday passed only 7 votes and it now remains with 21 votes.
Government said it plans to finish with Committee of Supply by this Thursday so that the 2016/17 National Budget is passed by Friday. But with the pace at which the House is passing the votes, it seem unlikely that Government will meet its target and one way of meeting the target, Leader of House has resolved to extend sitting time up to late hours. On Tuesday, the Leader of House also forced the House to continue meeting till 20:00 hours since the business during the day was done at snails pace.
Lilongwe is facing water problems and some residential areas go days without water.
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