Audit exposes plunder, ghost workers
Malawi continues to lose millions of donor and taxpayer money through fraud perpetrated by both senior and junior civil servants in various government ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) through manipulation of systems, a recent audit has exposed.
The audit, undertaken by the National Audit Office (NAO) for the financial year ending June 30 2016, has also revealed continued existence of ghost workers, civil servants taking home double salaries and abuse of payments through allowances, dubious fuel allocations, mobile phone airtime and other expenses.
The audit also inspected the Human Resource Management Information System (HRMIS) and reviewed the public service payroll.
The report, which Auditor General Stephenson Kamphasa has submitted to Parliament and whose copy The Nation has seen, found that ghost workers—physically non-existent employees only found on the payroll—are still common in ministries of Health; Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development; Education, Science and Technology; and Natural Resources, Energy and Mining.
The same ministries and departments were also found to be culprits of manipulation of salaries and allowances, the report said.
In Ministry of Health alone, about K5 536 546.07 was overpaid as a result of data manipulation reported for the period under review: January 2014 to February 2015.
In the Ministry of Education, on the other hand, a review of the payroll reviewed that a Mr Kenan Banda was paid K3 729 315.08 in salary arrears for the period between January 2014 and February 2015 as the officer allegedly fraudulently claimed monthly salary and rural teachers’ allowance arrears of K246 859.22 and K10 000 respectively.
The audit also revealed that government spent K119 288 025.35 on officers getting double salaries either from the same ministry or from different ministries while K80 333 501.06 was lost through officers manipulating salaries.
In one case, a retired nurse from Blantyre District Health Office was reintroduced on the payroll in November 2014 on a month-to-month basis twice with two slightly different names, namely Joyce Kapanga and Joyce Kapange.
Reads the audit report in part: “When interviewed, Mrs Joyce Kapanga presented a letter of resignation effective December 2014 and she confirmed to have stopped reporting for duties. However, she was still appearing on the payroll.”
Reacting to the report, Billy Mayaya, a governance activist, yesterday said it was a sign that much of the touted changes in government since previous audit reports and the Cashgate in particular, plus the recent public reforms, have been a flop.
Minister of Information and Communications Technology Nicholas Dausi, the official government spokesperson, reacted angrily to suggestions that the report signifies policy failures by the current administration.
He said: “We [government] have done something. The World Bank has come back. IMF programme is back on track.”
On a positive note, the report notes significant improvements in the financial reporting with misallocations reducing to K427 974 099 compared to K4 857 041 661.90 for the financial year ended June 30 2015, representing a 91 percent improvement.
Unsupported payments also improved to K517 115 701.82 compared to K16 367 012 333.28 for the financial year ended June 30 2015, representing 97 percent improvement.
