Africa-Press – Malawi. It is no longer a far-fetched idea that Malawi is slowly but steadily nourishing her two twins—fraud and corruption—who are, unfortunately now, quickly making sure that this nation—their mother—is reduced to nothing but shambles, as far as economic prudence is concerned.
Now, this is not only lugubrious, but also brings the all of us into some such lukewarm nonentities. Nothings who seem to admit that these two twin brothers—fraud and corruption—have either become too cold to handle or too hot to hold.
Yet, it is not the all of us. Some individuals and some companies—both national and multinational—have been at the centre of it all. At the centre of propelling fraud and corruption in our motherland, enabling the siphoning of what would have been some social cash transfer to an aging mother in Titi or tuition for a poor university student whose single mother in either Eswazini or M’baluku can only afford relished nsima in the rainy season.
It is sad that just a bunch of thieves in this country, masquerading as good politicians, business moguls and public servants continue to be the only ones enjoying a national cake which we must all partake of.
It is disturbing and frustrating that we have all been there, sat back and watched our nation degenerate into an economically cripple at the expense of these two boys—fraud and corruption.
We at Nyasa Times say no more to this gobbledygook. Malawi has been losing billions of dollars in public funds to private individuals who siphon the green buck into Dubai, UK, Hong Kong, Mauritius and other tax haven countries.
Some of these crooked business moguls have the cheek of calling Malawians “dogs” and “pigs” who do not deserve anything good. “Dziko ndi wanu koma ndalama ndi wathu“. We are all aware of who says this. Fellow black Malawians, they think and treat you like fools!
Money lost through these crooks could have otherwise funded the country’s development agenda—which, in line with UN sustainable development goals, commits to giving every Malawian basic necessities like food, good shelter, and access to quality education and health care. Sadly, most Malawians continue drinking water with goats. They even walk long distances to fetch such water as well.
We must not forget, as a country, that in 2020, the corruption watchdog Transparency International ranked Malawi 129th out of 180 countries in public sector corruption, scoring 30 out of 100 points on the global Corruption Perceptions Index. And, we must remember that we are one of the poorest countries, if not the poorest on planet earth, not that we do not have the money or resources – no! But because as Malawians, we fail ourselves!
Of course, we must also not forget that between 2009 and 2014, the country lost around $723 million (about K542 billion) to fraud and corruption in the name of dubious contracts to some businesspersons—most of the Asian business community, who are defrauding and corrupting even today.
Now, we at Nyasa Times have an idea. For these corrupt and fraudulent their owners must be arrested at once, their companies blacklisted and all their assets confiscated.
ACB, PPDA, FIU, RBM, Fiscal Police, MRA, OPC, Commercial Banks and Courts must free themselves from the capture. We believe these organisations have governance mandates but their top officials have sold this country to fraud and corruption. For instance, why does PPDA and ACB fail to ban fraudulent or corrupt business owners? Officials from these organisations must be investigated. There is a saying “Follow the money, it leaves foot steps”.
Why are the FIU, RBM and Commercial Bank not stopping the fraudulent invoices from being approved for payment? Accomplices and facilitators of criminal activities. This must be done now or never! Let’s expose fraud and corruption actors. Nyasa Times is watching and following you – enough is enough!
