Committee to summon Goodall over water project

The Parliamentary Committee on Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development has expressed dismay with the decision by Minister of Finance, Economic Planning and Development Goodall Gondwe to backtrack on his promise on the Lilongwe-Salima Water Project.

The committee’s chairperson Joseph Chidanti-Malunga said in an interview yesterday that Gondwe had betrayed their trust by failing to bring the project to the House to allow members of Parliament (MPs) to debate and scrutinise it.

“In the first place, it is not the committee that brought this issue to Parliament. It was him. So, after analysis, after we met the chief executive officer for Lilongwe Water Board, we thought that the best way would be to bring the issue to Parliament so that we debate it.

“But now he is saying he is not going to bring it. They are saying they are not obliged to bring it to Parliament. Now, if he is refusing to bring this issue to Parliament, what we are going to do as a committee is to summon him to appear before us to explain,” he said.

Malunga has since given the minister until tomorrow to bring the issue to the House, failing which he would be summoned to appear before the committee.

But Gondwe said in a separate interview that he could not take a non-existent project to Parliament. n