Parliament facilitates recovery of MPs’ loans

By Wezzie Gausi:

The Parliament of Malawi has started facilitating the process of recovering loans from members of Parliament (MPs) whose seats were declared vacant.

As it stands, about six seats are vacant after the court nullified parliamentary election results.

For instance, on June 22 2020, High Court Judge Rowland Mbvundula nullified parliamentary election results for Phalombe North Constituency while, on June 8 2020, High Court Judge Joseph Chigona declared Mangochi North East parliamentary seat results invalid.

In December 2019, Judge Sylvester Kalembera also nullified Mangochi West Parliamentary election results after Democratic Progressive Party (DPP)’s Geoffrey Chiwondo was declared winner. The outcome did not impress independent candidate Simeon Harrison, who challenged the results in court.

Kalembera further nullified parliamentary election results for Chikwawa East, Nsanje North and Nsanje Central constituencies and ordered the Malawi Electoral Commission (Mec) to hold reruns within 60 days.

This was after Mec had declared Francis Kasaila of DPP winner in Nsanje Central Constituency, Esther Mcheka Chilenje (DPP) winner in Nsanje North Constituency and Sam Khumbanyiwa of the United Democratic Front as the winner of the Chikwawa East Constituency election.

Now, after the courts’ determination on electoral issues, Parliament spokesperson Ian Mwenye has said loans that MPs receive come from different banks and not Parliament as an institution.

He said legislators are supposed to pay 50 percent out of the total cost for initial loans they get upon taking office.

Mwenye said Parliament was in the process of starting repayment where there are balances.

“If a Member of Parliament ceases to perform the functions of their office for whatever reason, the Parliament of Malawi has an agreement with the concerned bank to deduct at source from terminal benefits and remit the same to the bank in settlement of any outstanding loan balance,” Mwenye said.