Balaka West Needs School Meals For Children To Stay In School-Hon Shanil

Member of Parliament for Balaka West, Patricia Shanil Dzimbiri has sent an appeal to Government to consider introducing school meal programme in her constituency as food shortage affecting most families in the area brings panic of school drop outs and absenteeism among pupils. 

Over, 6 million Malawians will again this year face food shortage as droughts and floods in most parts of the country have affected yield of maize which is a staple food situation. The situation is likely to have a huge negative impact on education of children from most vulnerable poor families that have no food because children will be hungry to go to school.

Speaking in the National Assembly on Wednesday, Honorable Shanil Dzimbiri made the plea to Government that her area needs school Feeding Programe to keep children in school.

She said for two consecutive years, her area has been badly hit by floods and drought rendering more families going without food due to low harvest. 

Honorable Shanil fears that most learners will drop out of school as they will focus on fetching food than education and urged Government to begin providing porridge when school begins.

“I stressed on the point of school feeding programe due to the hunger in my constituency” said Hon Shanil Dzimbiri later in an interview, and she stressed “My constituency has been badly affected, because it is two consecutive years, last year we had floods and people did not harvest enough and this year we had drought so people haven’t harvested anything.”

She then said “So I feel very strongly that if Government introduce this school feeding programe it means so many children will be enticed to go to school looking forward to eat something from school and at the end of the day they will learn looking. So, they will be enticed to go to school looking at the situation in their homes.”

The Balaka West legislator indicated that areas including T/A Chamnthunya, Sub T/A Phalula and Sr. Chief Nsamala are some of the most affected villages.

She said in total, there are 37 primary schools but almost half of these schools do not have school feeding programe. She noted that the school feeding programme mostly porridge being provided in other schools has shown that it is an effective tool to encourage pupils to continue with their education regardless of hunger situation in their homes as such schools continue to register low absenteeism’s and drop outs when compared to schools that do not offer school meals.

“Interesting thing is that pupils who stay close to the schools that do not offer school meals they prefer to go to far schools that offer porridge. They pass schools closer to them and goes far distances to find schools that are offering school meals.” She noted 

“So, I strongly feel that it can work wonders.” She added who said she would be happy if Government comes to her rescue in September when new school session begins “I will be very happy and it will register tremendous figure of students going to school, I bet you.”

Among other things that Honorable Shanil Dzimbiri also highlighted in the National Assembly when contributing to the debate on the 2016/17 National Budget motion, was on lack of secondary schools to reduce school dropouts among girls.

She said the existing Community Day Secondary Schools are much far apart, preventing a girl child to go to school because of long distances.

“We have three Community Day Secondary Schools which are far apart and prohibits a girl child to have a desire to go to school because of long distances” she said urging Government to ensure that there are more secondary schools in her area that are closer to encourage girls to go to school 

“Right now they end up getting married quickly, so there is nothing to entice them. So if the school is nearby I feel that the girl child will remain in school.” She emphasized while indicating that areas of Group village Chiyembekezo and Mkomwa needs Community Day Secondary Schools and those communities have already mobilized resources including bricks and sand, redden themselves to help Government once it consider helping them with secondary school

Parliamentary Committee Urges House To Pass ATI, Communications Bill

Also Remove Custom Duty On Broadcasting, Telecommunication Equipment

Samuel Kawale

The Malawi Parliamentary Committee on Media, Information and Communications has urged the House to pass Access to Information bill and remove some Customs Duty on media and telecommunications equipments as way of promoting transparency and accountability in the public service and sustainable growth of the media, information and communications industry. 

The call was made in the House on Wednesday evening following findings on the Committee’s visit to various Media Houses and mobile operators in the Country from 7th to 11th September 2015.

Presenting the report, Chairperson for the Committee, Hon. Samuel Kawale noted that both media houses and the mobile operator’s wants Access to Information Bill and Communications Bill passed into laws by the National Assembly when they are presented in the House. 

On this, the committee has recommended that Government has to consider speed up the process of presenting all the relevant Bills to be passed into laws noting that such new laws will promote transparency and accountability in the public service and also fill the existing gaps by the continuous use of outdated legislation.

On Customs and Duty, the committee’s report noted that both media houses and mobile operators requested for the removal of Customs Duty because rates of Customs Duty on equipment are high. And pacifically on the broadcasting equipment, the committee said the rates makes dissemination of information to the general public more expensive. 

“Your Committee recommends that the Government should consider revise downwards Customs Duty Rates on Broadcasting and telephone equipment to promote the sustainable growth of the media, information and communications industry.” Said Hon. Samuel Kawale adding that mobile operators are also complaining of vandalism of the telephone equipments by the general public which are slowing down the development progress of the industry

The Report noted with appreciation that both media and mobile operators have made substantial investments throughout the country in modern technology to provide quality services to all Malawians. 

Hon Kawale said his Committee was very impressed with the infrastructural and technological developments that most private media houses are putting in place, investing a lot of money in modern equipment for both radio and television stations. 

"You may wish to note that some media houses plan to go into multiple channel broadcasting and others have already been invited to broadcast on DSTV." He informed the House noting that the media houses are also playing important role in socio economic development because they are employing a lot of people throughout the country with their wide spread in all districts of the country

The committee also commended the mobile sector for playing crucial role not only on talk service but also on internet services, mobile money as well as providing employment and being one of the biggest tax payers in the country.

But the committee has encouraged all media houses and mobile operators in the country to adopt and adapt to new technologies “all the time” in order to survive in the international media market competition. 

Speaking of visit to Malawi Communications Regulatory Authority (MACRA) the committee noted that Cyber Security is the main issue in the ICT world today and as such, the Electronic Transaction bill is intended to curb such cybercrimes. But the committee has encouraged MACRA as regulator to continue being accountable and transparent to the General public in carrying out its duties so as to promote further growth of the Media, Information and Communications industry.

During the visit, however, the committee was not impressed with the state of infrastructure and equipment at the state broadcaster, the Malawi Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) as the station has old equipment requiring replacement. The committee has recommended Government to inject adequate resources to MBC for renovation of infrastructure and procurement of modern broadcasting equipment.

Objective of the visit was to appreciate success and challenges in the media, information and communications industry; particularly to appreciate the state of infrastructure, progress being made on some projects that fall within the mandate of the committee and to appreciate the success and challenges of the MACRA.

The committee visited a total of four radio stations, televisions and print media houses namely; Zodiak Broadcasting Station, Blantyre News Papers Limited (The Times Group), Nation Publications Limited, and MBC. On telephone companies were; Telokom Netowks Limited, and Malawi Telecommunications Limited, Multi-Choice Malawi Limited and the MACRA were also visited

Welfare Committee Hope To Conclude GPF Negotiations This Week

The Parliamentary Welfare Committee which is negotiating with Finance Minister on the delayed General Purpose Fund (GPF) loans has expressed hope that Government will conclude discussions either this week or next week with positive outcome. 

Members of Parliament are demanding Government to implement the GPF loan where every Member of Parliament is entitled to up to obtain K5 million loan from banks to be repaid before expiry of their term of office. 

Honorable Alex Major, Chairperson for the Committee leading the discussions with Finance Minister Goodall Gondwe said in an interview that meetings that began on Tuesday were continued on Wednesday and there is hope that everything will be implemented.

“The Condition of service matter is in progress, and we are still negotiating” he said, “but as MPs we know that we have an obligation to meet and the obligation is to scrutinize the budget. So, what we have decided is, as long as we are negotiating but we should also progress with budget scrutiny and we are scrutinizing the budget and also we are progressing with our discussions with Government.”

He said at the moment the Finance Minister has neither denied nor accept any of the demands by legislators but all seems that he understands their concern. 

“But it is not a matter of him understanding but you know, Government need to implement our conditions of service” he noted while expressing hope that this week “we would have reach the compromise whereby Government must accept to implement our conditions of service.”

Honorable Major also indicated that as of Wednesday, the Minister said he wants to make further consultations before telling the Committee whether Government will accept their demands or will not.

“He said he needs to consult so we are waiting for him to consult the President am sure, otherwise all is in progress.”

Since Monday this week, the legislators from opposition side vent their anger in the House over the delays by Government to implement the loan. The business of the National Assembly between Monday and Tuesday was disturbed as the House had to be suspended several times due to uproar when members from opposition insisted to deliberate on their condition of service and suspend the debate on the national Budget.

However, Government has maintained that it is facing economic challenges and it will not implement the legislators’ loans.

Parliamentary Budget Committee Pessimistic With Malawi Projected GDP Growth Of 5.1 Percent

Chiphiko: Nation needs to pray 5 times a day to achieve such ambitious rate of growth

The Parliamentary Committee on Budget says nothing tangible for this year’s Budget to make the Malawi economy register real GDP growth rate from 3.1 to 5.1 percent.

Chairperson for the Committee, Rhino Chiphiko finished presenting the Committee's findings on Tuesday in the National Assembly, a response to Minister of Finance Goodall Gondwe's recently presented K1.136 trillion national budget estimates in the National Assembly for the 2016/17 financial year.

Parliamentary Budget Committee Chairperson, Rhino Chiphiko says his Committee established that the only positive areas in the budget has been large allocation to the Ministry of Agriculture which represent 17 percent of the total national budget and allocation for the food purchase.

The committee further noted the proposals to reform the Farm Input Subsidy Program and plans in Public Finance Management.

However, the Budget committee found number of worrying developments in the Budget which led the Committee to conclude that Malawi will fail to achieve real growth.

"Mr. Speaker Sir, events in the natural, or, Act of God, and in the human realm portend a difficult future. Climate change and extreme adverse weather events, unstable exchange rate, persistent high inflation, high interest rates and constrained fiscus, all portend a sluggish and depressed economy. An economy is in an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) like a patient on a Life Supporting Machine. Malawi is in an economic crisis." emphasised Chiphiko with urge that "But we must do something" mentioning lowering of interest rates and boost industrial production.

In the Committee findings presentation, performance of many sectors in the Malawi will be adversely affected by poor performance of the Agriculture sector as it is apparent that climate is still affecting the sector yet Malawi continues to depend on the sector.

According to Chiphiko, later in an interview said Malawi may this year register a negative 2.5 growth rate and not surpass the average growth in the regional which is around 3 percent. He said the committee believes that Ministers projected growth figure will need the nation "to pray more than 5 times a day in order to achieve such ambitious rate of growth."

Chiphiko said the budget has large allocation on expenditure for the public debt charges and interest repayment and that this will make Malawi fail to meet Millennium Development Goals as less has been allocated to the Development programmes.

His committee further notes that interest rates in banks remains stubbornly high making lives of many to be unbearable in the year which 8 million Malawians will face food shortage.

The Committee emphasise that interests rates must be revised downwards to make people able to borrow from banks and able to repay loans at reasonable rates. 

The Committee has among others noted that number of tax proposals cannot lead to any economic recovery and may even push the economy deeper into recession.