{"id":39485,"date":"2023-01-27T22:28:57","date_gmt":"2023-01-27T22:28:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2"},"modified":"2023-01-27T22:55:05","modified_gmt":"2023-01-27T22:55:05","slug":"escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2","title":{"rendered":"Escom, Committee lock horns over project funds"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Malawi. <\/strong><\/span>The Electricity Supply Corporation of Malawi (Escom) and Parliamentary Committee on Natural Resources have clashed over the use of funds under the Malawi Electrification Access Programme (Meap).<\/p>\n

Chairperson of the committee Werani Chilenga claims that the company has diverted funds for the project to clear its backlog of applications for electricity connections. He said this when Escom officials appeared before his committee at Parliament this week. Escom CEO Kamkwamba Kumwenda did not attend the meeting.<\/p>\n

Chilenga accused the company of diverting the funds which were meant to connect 300, 000 households for free, implement the Mozambique interconnector project and buy transformers.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat Escom is doing is not what Parliament approved. Imagine, Escom is taking funds meant for other things, clearing the backlog of connections when customers already paid for the service.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is happening is uncalled for, and we have sent them back to revisit the project agreement and report back to us. When we pass bills in Parliament, it is our duty to see to it that they are implemented exactly as agreed,\u201d Chilenga said. But Kamkwamba disputed Chilenga\u2019s statement that the project is for free.<\/p>\n

\u201cAccording to the Project Appraisal Connection Policy, clause 32, customers are supposed to make a financial contribution of $34. This represents a 31 percent connection fee for drop line and 12 percent of connection cost for a one pole service.<\/p>\n

\u201cAdditionally, the appraisal states that the customer must pay $16 dollars for service fee and $8 dollars for inspection fee,\u201d Kamkwamba said.<\/p>\n

He further said: \u201cSo it\u2019s not true that the Meap connections are 100 percent free. If the committee has an alternative agreement, let them make it available to us accordingly. Otherwise, such comments are misleading.<\/p>\n

\u201cEscom is committed to make sure that it delivers on its mandate and will not be deterred by opposition forces,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Principal Secretary for Energy Alfonso Chikuni said he was not aware that Escom was diverting Meap funds. Chikuni said the ministry would follow up on the project design document and the claim that funds were being diverted.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, if what the committee is saying is true, then we have a serious problem. Of course I am new to the ministry but this has given me interest to look for the project documents to see how the money was meant to be used,\u201d Chikuni said.<\/p>\n

In 2019, the National Assembly approved the $150 million World Bank loan to implement Meap as part of the implementation modalities for the National Energy Policy of 2018.<\/p>\n

The funds were meant to increase electricity access from 11 to 30 percent by 2030. Malawi is one of the countries in the world with the lowest electricity connections.<\/p>\n

For More News And Analysis About Malawi<\/a> Follow Africa-Press<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Malawi. The Electricity Supply Corporation of Malawi (Escom) and Parliamentary Committee on Natural Resources have clashed over the use of funds under the Malawi Electrification Access Programme (Meap). Chairperson of the committee Werani Chilenga claims that the company has diverted funds for the project to clear its backlog of applications for electricity connections. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":39483,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,12],"tags":[233,371,1780,234,5684,537],"class_list":["post-39485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-policy","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-malawi","tag-escom","tag-malawi","tag-meap","tag-world-bank"],"yoast_head":"\nEscom, Committee lock horns over project funds - Malawi<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Electricity Supply Corporation of Malawi (Escom) and Parliamentary Committee on Natural Resources have clashed over ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Escom, Committee lock horns over project funds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Electricity Supply Corporation of Malawi (Escom) and Parliamentary Committee on Natural Resources have clashed over ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Malawi\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-01-27T22:28:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-01-27T22:55:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/malawi\/sites\/36\/2023\/01\/postQueueImg_1674845987.24.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"720\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"612\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Escom, Committee lock horns over project funds\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-01-27T22:28:57+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-01-27T22:55:05+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2\"},\"wordCount\":453,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/malawi\/sites\/36\/2023\/01\/postQueueImg_1674845987.24.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Africa Press\",\"Africa Press-Malawi\",\"ESCOM\",\"Malawi\",\"MEAP\",\"world bank\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"policy\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/malawi\/all-news\/escom-committee-lock-horns-over-project-funds-2\",\"name\":\"Escom, Committee lock horns over project funds - 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