Minister of Local Government and Rural Development Ben Phiri has called for a ceasefire between members of Parliament (MPs) and councillors over the Constituency Development Fund (CDF), saying the money belongs to communities, not politicians.
He said CDF implementation can proceed through existing council structures such as Area Development Committees (ADCs), even without MPs and councillors.
in villages. | Ntchindi Meki
Phiri was speaking yesterday in Ntchisi during a meeting with council officials, councillors and other stakeholders.
He said: “There is no government purse for MPs or councillors. Public funds are administered by a controlling officer. CDF is money for poor people in villages; these fights are unnecessary and must stop.”
The minister’s intervention comes on the back of President Peter Mutharika’s decision this week to veto the controversial CDF Constitutional Amendment Bill.
Mutharika has since ordered the Ministers of Justice and Constitutional Affairs as well as Finance, Economic Planning and Decentralisation to draft guidelines for managing CDF that do not compromise financial integrity.
Phiri said the guidelines are almost complete and will be ready ahead of the next parliamentary sitting.
Meanwhile, governance activists have said the minister’s position show capacity concerns.
In an interview yesterday, Centre for Social Accountability and Transparency (Csat) executive director Willy Kambwandira said local structures were never designed to manage politically charged funds of the scale now proposed.
“ADCs and VDCs were meant for participatory planning, not managing a high-stakes discretionary fund tied to MPs’ political survival,” he said, warning of elite capture and weak accountability without sustained capacity building.
Malawi Local Government Association (Malga) executive director Hadrod Mkandawire clarified that ADCs will not handle the money directly.
“They will only identify projects for approval by councils. Implementation and coordination will be done by the council’s administrative machinery under controlling officers,” he said.
Last May, the High Court, sitting as a three-Judge panel comprising Justices Mzonde Mvula, Howard Pemba and Eddah Ngwira-Mwakibinga, delivered its judgement in the case of The Registered Trustees of the Malawi Local Government Association versus Ministry of Local Government and the Attorney General.
Ruling in favour of Malga, the court declared the guidelines for CDF and Water Resources Fund (2022), issued by the Ministry of Local Government, unconstitutional.
The guidelines had vested MPs with primary responsibility over local development plans and granted them voting rights in local councils as ex-officio members under Section 5(1) of the Local Government Act.
The court observed that an MP, as part of the Legislature under Section 8 of the Constitution, participates in the enactment of laws, but by assuming an ex-officio role in the council with powers to determine the management and control of development funds, including voting rights, undertakes functions that fall within the domain of the Executive under Section 7.
According to the court, this dual role contravenes the doctrine of separation of powers under sections 7, 8 and 9 of the Constitution.
As a result, the court declared the guidelines invalid to the extent of their inconsistency with the Constitution.
It further directed that the guidelines be revised to exclude MPs from such roles and that alternative stakeholders be identified to uphold constitutional compliance and the integrity of the oversight function.
But, instead of respecting the ruling, the MPs decided to insert a whole new CDF chapter in the Republican Constitution that would have paved the way for legislation enabling them to directly control CDF, which will in the next fiscal year be pegged at K5 billion per constituency from K220 million currently.
