They say a beggar is not a chooser, but the Association of People with Albinism (Apam) has attached conditions to President Peter Mutharika’s donation of security gadgets before receiving them.
The association has said it will not accept the gadgets because of the labelling that reads ‘APM cares.”
Apam deputy secretary general Ian Simbota confirmed yesterday that the association would request relevant people to remove the words on the devices before they could accept and start using them.
“Our request is that these words must be removed. They were procured using taxpayers’ money, so why should they be personalised? Our interest is to ensure they respect public resources,” said Simbota.
When contacted, Presidential press secretary Mgeme Kalirani said he would call back for response, but he had not done so by press time.
The devices were launched last week in Lilongwe by Minister of Gender, Children, Disability and Social Welfare, Cecilia Chazama. who said the donation signified commitment from the President to address the issue of abduction and killings of people with albinism.
Mutharika donated the gadgets to the association as one way of ensuring smooth implementation of the National Action Plan (NAP) for persons with albinism.
The association is in need of at least 10 000 security agents, but so far only 3 000 are available. Few days ago, Apam also received a donation of 120 security gadgets from friends of the United Kingdom (UK).
In February this year, Mutharika hosted some persons with albinism at Kamuzu Palace in Lilongwe where he promised to buy the security gadgets and release K3.1 billion towards implementation of the NAP.
Out of the said money, K250 million was already released to various stakeholders for implementation of the NAP
