Chakwera warns ‘lazy’ civil servants

President Lazarus Chakwera says the honeymoon is over for civil servants uncommitted to their work as they frustrate his administration’s efforts to develop the country.

The President said this yesterday when he presided over the opening of the Malawi School of Government (MSG) at Kanengo in Lilongwe.

He said when he took over the country’s leadership, he found a lot of irregularities and disorder resulting from poor decision-making, poor coordination between government ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), laxity and poor performance due to lack of capacity as well as misallocation of human resources, among others.

Said Chakwera: “It’s no longer time to tolerate those under-performing in the civil service. This is why I am instructing the Secretary to the President and Cabinet (SPC) Colleen Zamba to work with principal secretaries, heads of parastatal organisations and district commissioners to identify capacity gaps in the civil service.”

The MSG, which is a year and a half old, was formed through an Act of Parliament of 2022 by merging the Staff Development Institute (SDI) at Mpemba in Blantyre and the Malawi Institute of Management (MIM) at Kanengo in Lilongwe.

MSG director general Dr. Asiyati Chiweza said since its establishment, the school has registered a number of milestones on staff development through refresher courses which are in line with the Malawi Growth and Development Strategy.

“We have also introduced other courses aimed at building the human capital for the country. So far a number of top civil servants have been trained here and we are continuing training more so that we create the needed capacity,” she said.

Chiweza said to achieve all this, MSG has developed a strategic plan which focuses on full institutional integration, rebranding, financial sustainability, infrastructure development and human capital development.

She further disclosed that as part of reforms, MSG has cleared K777 million of the pension arrears amounting to K962 million which it inherited when the two institutions were merged.

Zamba said her office will act on the President’s directive and ensure that all civil servants who need capacity building are grilled through MSG so that the civil service can have capable human resource for progress.

“We are even going to sit down and see if we can have a budget line for this because as the President alluded to, well trained human resource is a catalyst to development so we will take this seriously,” she said.

Before the main event, the President inspected a session for officials from various MDAs who have been undergoing a refresher course at the school.