Sluggish Malawi economic spur corruption and fraud
AMA associates, a newly formed organisation specialised in fraud prevention and risk management, say, Malawi’s sluggish economic development is due to rampant fraud and corruption in both the private and public sectors.
AMA associates managing director Elwin Sichiola said this during a press conference in Lilongwe organised to announce the anti-fraud and corruption conference which will take place in Lilongwe next month.
According to Sichiola, after 49 years, the country was supposed to be very developed but due to fraud and corruption, it has stagnated.
Said Sichiola: “We believe that one of the key reasons of this stagnation and sluggish social economic development is the issue of fraud and corruption in both private and public sectors. It is not a secret that our public sector is synonymous with issues of bribery and fraud. One can hardly enjoy any service in the public sector without first greasing the hands of those who are expected to deliver the service as a right to those seeking it.”
Quoting the 2012 Report to the Nations by the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE,) Sichiola said on average, organisations are losing approximately five to six percent of their annual revenue to fraud.
“Transparency international also highlights the evils of corruption by stating that corruption is one of the major threats facing humanity because it destroys lives and communities and undermines countries and institutions. In some cases, fraud and corruption has generated into unpopular anger that threatens to further destabilise societies and exacerbate violent conflicts,” said Sichiola.
AMA project manager Antoinette Kalinde said the danger of fraud and corruption is that the primary victims are the poor and most vulnerable members of our societies.
“This is the reason we are now taking action by creating a platform in the form of a national conference to examine why our country is so corrupt and discuss ways of uprooting this evil among us. It is our goal to make this national fraud and corruption conference a yearly event because the issue is so complex and cannot be dealt with just one conference,” he said.
ACB director Justice Rezine Nzikamanda who will be one of the speakers at the event said the coming in of institutions such as AMA to fight corruption was a very good development because they are conversant with commercial institutions.
“It is true development in most African countries has stagnated due to corruption and if we have organisations such as AMA, they will help us deal with the vice,” said Nzikamanda.
From the public sector, the conference is targeting principal secretaries, directors, accountants, auditors, engineers, lawyers, doctors, human resource practitioners, statutory corporation heads and board members.
From the private sector, the conference is targeting chief executive officers, directors of finance, human resource managers, risk managers , security officers, investigators, auditors and accountants.
