By Deogratias Mmana:
Parliament convenes for the fourth meeting in the 50th session from February 9 to April 5 with a description of laziness and sleeping on duty added on to Members of Parliament (MPs) CVs.
A case study for that description is their passing—during the December sitting—of a Political Parties Amendment Bill that is inconsistent with the Constitution.
So as the lawmakers prepare to gather in Lilongwe, activists have told them to avoid embarrassing themselves by “waking up from their slumber”, scrutinize bills with open eyes and minds and make taxpayers’ money count.
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In the December sitting, the MPs passed the Political Parties Amendment Bill which empowers the State, to, on quarterly basis, provide funds to a political party represented in the National Assembly.
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The funding is meant to cater for that political party’s day-to-day activities including election expenses.
Currently, the State provides funds only to political parties which accumulated 10 percent of the votes in a general election and is represented in the august House.
With the current bill, that threshold is now being removed.
And once assented to by the President, even the smallest of political parties represented in Parliament would tart receiving funds from the State depending on the size of their representation, according to Ministry of Justice.
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But it was Malawi Law Society (MLS) that exposed the ‘illegality’ of the bill which more than 190 MPs felt it “right” to pass when it is clearly inconsistent with the supreme law of the land.
MLS president Patrick Mpaka said the legislators passed the bill for their own personal greed and asked President Lazarus Chakwera not to assent to it.
Malawi News wanted to understand how the bill was passed without the legislators detecting the inconstancy with the Constitution where there is a whole committee of legal affairs, Clerk of Parliament and other MPs who are also lawyers in the House and should have checked it before it was tabled.
We also wanted to find whether the Leader of the House asks for legal guidance on each bill before it is passed so that he is sure of what the House is passing.
Legal Affairs Committee blames CoP
The Legal Affairs Committee chairperson Albert Mbawala said it was the Clerk of Parliament who slept on duty because being a private members’ bill, she had time to scrutinize the bill unlike the MPs.
Mbawala said: “What happens is that when bills come to Parliament, they are officially referred to the Legal Affairs Committee for scrutiny by the Clerk of Parliament.
“But sometimes bills are rushed through the house without being referred to the committee. And in the case of the bill you are referring to, it was a Private Members bill and it was not referred to my committee for thorough scrutiny and indeed the anomaly was discovered when the bill was passed.
“So, it is not that the committee slept on the job, no. The authorities, Clerk of Parliament, did not do the needful and the bill was rushed through.”
Leader of the House admits lapse
Leader of the House Richard Chimwendo Banda said on Wednesday that while this was a Private Members’ Bill and that the government side could not do anything, the House should have detected the anomaly and refer it to the Legal Affairs Committee.
Banda said: “That was a Private Members’ bill brought by Honourable Ned Poya from the UDF [United Democratic Front] and not government bill. Our [government] bills are very clear.
“We just received the bill. Such bills [private members] do not go to legal affairs committee. They do not even write anything. Government is absolute quiet.”
Challenged on why the House did not detect the anomaly when it was tabled when there are many lawyers in the House, Banda said: “That is the right thinking. Members of the Legal Affairs Committee are private members. They should have seen the anomaly.”
He added: “The House can decide to refer [such anomalies] to Legal Affairs Committee.”
We sent a questionnaire to the National Assembly spokesperson Ian Mwenye for the Clerk of Parliament to respond on the matter.
Mwenye acknowledged receipt of the questionnaire and after reminders on Thursday and yesterday, he said: I need more time.”
When the bill was passed, Zomba Ntonya law maker Ned Poya, who brought the bill, described the development as a great day for democracy in the country.
MPs slept on the job
Centre for Human Rights and Rehabilitation executive director Michael Kaiyatsa described the legislators as having been sleeping on the job when they passed the bill without detecting the inconsistency it has with the Constitution.
Kaiyatsa has since appealed to the MPs to wake up from slumber and scrutinize bills seriously before passing them during the forthcoming sitting.
“The failure by the MPs to detect the inconsistency between the bill and the Constitution is a matter of serious concern.
“It shows that either our MPs are ignorant of the Constitution or simply do not care what the Constitution says,” Kaiyatsa said.
Kaiyatsa added: “Either way, it is bad for democracy. The fact that all lawmakers who made contributions on the bill spoke in favour of the legislation is even more shocking.
“It conforms to the long held suspicion that MPs are ready to do anything to protect their political and economic interests, which is bad for our democracy.”
Centre for Social Accountability and Transparency (Csat) Executive Director Willy Kambwandira for their laziness in passing the bill without serious scrutiny.
“Parliament appears to have abandoned its oversight role. There is no serious scrutiny of bills and this is a bad sign and practice. Our MPs lack analytical skills.
“We are the only National Assembly in the region where MPs spend the least time on bills. It is sad that despite the availability of an enabling legal and legislative framework for Parliament’s scrutiny, Parliament has lacked stamina to scrutinize the bills,” Kambwandira said.
He added that often times the bills appear without adequate notice for MPs and that pertinent details are hidden.
“In short, there is no transparency and meaningful scrutiny of bills and this undermines the integrity of Parliament,” Kambwandira said.
Executive director of Church and Society of the Blantyre synod of the Church of Central Africa Presbyterian Reverend Master Jumbe asked Malawians to always elect people who are capable of following parliamentary deliberations with seriousness.
“What happened is a clear indication that most of our parliamentarians are not fit to be in the national assembly.
“This is what happens when people are elected not on merit but because of tribal, party or religious connections,” Jumbe said
Law doesn’t stand
MLS said the bill in its current state does not stand.
Mpaka said the amendment of the bill runs contrary to the Constitution in the sense that if a party does not have 10 percent representation, then it falls short to represent people, hence no need for taxpayers to fund it.
“The authority to govern derives from the people through universal and equal suffrage according to Section 6 of the Constitution. So, if, as political party, you cannot get even one-tenth of the voice of the people, who are you representing”
“You are representing yourself and your clique of friends and family. A political party must have some national presence and acceptance seems to be the idea behind such laws. You cannot be getting the people’s money to fund your family business disguised as a political party. That is the spirit of Section 40 (2) of the Constitution. The amendment to the Political Parties Act made by Parliament runs contrary to that constitutional spirit,” Mpaka said.
