Analysis

Local govt: focus of development 

Former president Bakili Muluzi and his successor Bingu wa Mutharika were not keen to have local government elections. The last time Malawi had local government elections was in 2000, after Muluzi was pressurised by civil society organisations (CSOs) and opposition political parties.

All added up, Malawi has had no local government elections for the past 14 years.

This also means Malawi has had no councillors, rendering local governments ineffective. In the absence of councillors, some of the decisions made by councils have been contravening the Local Government Act.

However, for a country that has never had councillors for a long time and government has paid lip service to the decentralisation programme, it will be a real challenge for new councillors to perform their rightful role, which has been hijacked by parliamentarians over the years.

Local government is supposed to be semi-independent of central government so that councils can determine their own development activities independent of the central government.

Decentralisation has failed in Malawi. Government, under different political parties, has usurped the role and responsibilities of the local government.

Councils lack real authority to determine development activities. They are supposed to provide a variety of basic services to the residents such as sanitary sewage, grass cutting, electricity (streets), garbage collection and disposal, recreation facilities (e.g. swimming pools), day care, museums, parks and recreation, business licenses, liquor license, landscaping, libraries, public transport, police etc.

A number of these services are administered through the field services of central ministries or are outsourced while some of them are non-existent. For example, the cutting of grass is outsourced and the National Roads Authority identifies contractors to do the work. Everyone knows how ugly our cities look  during rainy season.

There is need for a paradigm shift from central government in the manner it operates. It needs to delegate most its responsibility to local government. For example, central government has no business running stadiums. This function should be delegated to city councils. Malawi should learn from other countries like South Africa where decentralisation is working. For example, unless the stadiums are owned by clubs, municipalities or city assembles own them. The massive FNB Stadium is owned by the City of Johannesburg while Moses Mabida is owned by the City of Durban.

Councils should also take the initiative to provide other services such as public transport. The transport sector has been left in the hands of mini-bus operators who do not care for the commuters.

Minibuses are often overloaded and the seats are so close to each other that people cannot sit comfortably. Moreover, residents should have a choice to choose what form of public transport to use. They should not be forced to use dirty, dilapidated and unroadworthy minibuses operated by rude and rowdy minibus crew. Many of these minibuses are a death trap and are on the road courtesy of corrupt traffic cops.

One cannot understand why city councils cannot introduce public transport to serve the ever growing population in cities. Provision of public transport is one of the services that city councils should provide to the residents.

In fact, city councils are almost dead in Malawi. They fail to provide basic services to the people. They even fail to construct proper public toilets or take care of existing ones.

Cities and townships are stinking because of uncollected garbage. Because of poor service delivery many residents are reluctant to pay city rates because they do not see any benefits.

The ushering in of councillors after May 20 should inject some life in city councils to improve service delivery. They need to come up with turnaround strategies. On the other hand, central government should ensure that more resources are pumped into local government for councillors to fulfill their role as custodians of development.

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