\n<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n
The scandal revolves around the IPC\u2019s decision in 2014 to sell off 177 tractors and 144 maize shellers \u2013 intended as drought relief for small farmers \u2013 to civil servants for a song.<\/p>\n
The tractors, purchased for R740,000 each, were sold for R100,000 each, raising a paltry R12-million.<\/p>\n
The scam was allegedly disguised as a routine public auction of government equipment.<\/p>\n
The Ombud\u2019s report \u2013 submitted, ironically, to the implicated parliamentary Speaker Msowoya two weeks ago \u2013 finds that the sale was \u201cillegal and irregular\u201d.<\/p>\n
Titled \u201cThe Present, The Future Overburdened\u201d, the report cites nine instances of gross maladministration by government officials.<\/p>\n
These include the fact that the members of the IPC were conflicted.<\/p>\n
No details are provided, but the clear implication is that they were beneficiaries of the sell-off.<\/p>\n
Other government failures listed in the report are:<\/strong><\/p>\n \u2022 The manner in which the Loan Authorisation Bill needed to raise money for the tractor purchase was rushed through parliament. Former finance minister Ken Kandodo told Parliament in 2010 that the loan would be repaid over 20 years;<\/p>\n \u2022 The fact that civil servants took verbal orders from the Presidency;<\/p>\n \u2022 Archaic financial record-keeping at the ministry of finance; and<\/p>\n \u2022 The procurement of obsolete and archaic equipment, described as \u201cmaladministration of the highest order\u201d.<\/p>\n the criminal sanctions are weak: a $60 fine and or two years in jail<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n The government\u2019s chief mechanical engineer, Hendrix Kazembe, is quoted as saying that the Sonalika Tractors were built using outdated technology from the 1970s.<\/p>\n The Ombud concludes: \u201cThe officials who were members of IPC presided over the sale of the farm machinery and benefited from the sale should be prosecuted in accordance with the Procurement Act.<\/p>\n \u201cI will write the Director of Public of Prosecutions in accordance with section 126 (c) of the constitution of the Republic of Malawi.\u201d<\/p>\n Section 19 of the Procurement Act stipulates that any person \u201cwho sits on an IPC and acquires an interest in a matter that is to be determined, needs to declare their interests and recuse themselves and are not to take part in the deliberations\u201d.<\/p>\n If convicted, the public servants would presumably lose their jobs. But the criminal sanctions are weak: a $60 fine and or two years in jail.<\/p>\n In March this year the Malawi Broadcasting Corporation quoted former agriculture minister Allan Chiyembekeza as saying that the sale of the equipment followed normal tender procedures and that interested individuals or groups submitted bids.<\/p>\n \u201cEvaluation of the bids was done by officers from different ministries and departments to ensure transparency,\u201d Chiyembekeza said.<\/p>\n \u201cAll bidders that met the set criteria were offered the opportunity to buy the equipment.\u201d<\/p>\n The scheme was supposed to improve food security and buffer peasant farmers from drought<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n The government has never explained why the equipment was put out to tender instead of being distributed to the small farmers who were supposed to benefit.<\/p>\n The tractors and shellers were part of a $50-million (R695-million) development scheme known as the Green Belt Initiative, which was set up to buffer millions of peasant farmers from drought.<\/p>\n Funded by a loan from the Export-Import Bank of India (Exim Bank), the scheme sought to put about a million hectares of farmland under irrigation and improve food security for peasant farmers, who make up 70% of Malawi\u2019s population.<\/p>\n The Ombud reveals that the finance ministry used an Indian-based company, Apollo International, to perform the contracts under the three line of credits from Exim Bank.<\/p>\n The first loan agreement between the government and the bank, dated May 14, 2008, was for $30-million.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n The money was to be used to finance supply of irrigation, storage, a tobacco threshing plant and One Village One Product, a scheme designed to encourage crop specialisation.<\/p>\n A later $50-million loan was intended to finance cotton processing facilities, as well as the Green Belt Initiative and One Village One Product.<\/p>\n A third loan, signed on December 13, 2012 was for $76.5-million and aimed to finance the development of an irrigation network, the establishment of a sugar refinery in the central district of Salima under the Green Belt initiative and development of fuel storage facilities.<\/p>\n However, Parliament only authorised the government to borrow $50-million.<\/p>\n Ombud r<\/strong>eceived death threats in connection with her investigation <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Last month, the parliament\u2019s public accounts committee called for state organs including the Anti-Corruption Bureau to probe the discrepancy.<\/p>\n \u201cMoney might have been siphoned to offshore accounts or split among greed politicians,\u201d said committee chairman Kamlepo Kalua.<\/p>\n The sugar mill and irrigation scheme, intended for small sugar cane producers who would feed the factory, is lying largely idle and damaged by vandalism.<\/p>\n Earlier this year Chimuza-Mwangonde told the Centre for Investigative Journalism (Malawi) that she had received death threats in connection with her investigation into large-scale graft in the the Green Belt Initiative.<\/p>\n State procurement chiefs are unlikely to face any music, despite being implicated in Ombud report<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22431,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stories"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4366"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4366\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"https:\/\/amabhungane.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/250x106.jpg\")
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