The Malawi’s central bank Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM) has devalued the kwacha by 44 percent effective today at midnight.
Following the devaluation, the kwacha will be selling at K1, 700 against the US dollar in authorised dealer banks from K1, 180.
In a statement, RBM Governor Wilson Banda says this follows the supply-demand imbalances and mismatch in the exchange rates in the cash and telegraphic transfer markets.
“Spot checks on some market players indicate that the market is able to clear bills at this rate,” says Banda.
The RBM Governor has however, said the bank will closely monitor developments in the market to avoid disorderly behavior among market players that may cause excessive volatility.
Malawi President Dr Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera has left Malawi for Saud Arabia where he is destined to attend Saudi-Africa Summit.
Addressing the press at Kamuzu International, President Dr Chakwera said Malawi desires and dreams is to achieve a self reliant nation. He said his vision is to achieve Malawi grow, grow and grow.
Said Chakwera: “You look at what I am going to Saudi Arabia for, primarily the Makanjira road, that area is extremely rich not just for agriculture; it can also be used for tourism and mining as well. We are talking about the ATM strategy, for immediate results, this is a significant roadmap helping us towards 2063.”
Chakwera said trade in Africa is extremely needed at this stage and that there is need to trade more so that the country does not rely on aid.
President Chakwera
The president said to do that “We have to produce quality products. We want to look at all this in light of our vision and see that this country can be propelled to exponential growth because of deliberate steps that we are talking.”
Chakwera departed for Saudi Arabia via Kamuzu International Airport. The primary purpose of his visit is to attend the inaugural Saudi–Africa Summit in Riyadh on the 10th and 11th of November.
The summit holds significant promise as it offers an opportunity for Malawi to strengthen its diplomatic and economic relations with Saudi Arabia. This engagement comes at a crucial time when both nations seek to strengthen their collaboration in various fields.
On the sidelines of the Summit, President Chakwera is slated to hold bilateral meetings with various stakeholders. These discussions are anticipated to explore opportunities for collaboration and investments between Malawi and Saudi Arabia in key sectors.
The President will have a significant interface with His Excellency Sultan Al Marshad, the Chief Executive Officer of the Saudi Fund. During this interaction, the President is expected to sign and finalize an agreement pertaining to the Makanjira road project.
Following his engagements in Saudi Arabia, President Chakwera will proceed to Egypt to attend an Intra Africa Trade Fair organized by the African Export-Import Bank (AFREXIM Bank) in partnership with the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) secretariat.
The trade fair serves as a vital platform for African countries to engage in discussions regarding the establishment of an integrated African market for goods and services.
The Advancing Girls Education in Africa (AGE Africa) is implementing the Malawi end-to end program in Dowa district with a mission to create life-changing opportunities to young women through initiatives in Education, Mentorship and Leadership Development.
AGE Africa is currently working in 9 districts in Malawi which are Dowa, Ntchisi, Mchinji, Kasungu, Balaka, Mangochi, Machinga, Zomba and Mulanje and in Dowa.
It is in 6 feeder primary schools and 9 secondary schools.
Mpakule
The organization provides scholarships which are awarded on an individual basis,of which each scholarship award is up to 4 years, if the scholarship recipient meets AGE Africa’s continued eligibility requirements.
Giving updates of the program, AGE Africa’s District Coordinator for Dowa Chauncy Kasenye, said scholarship payments are paid directly to the Ministry of Education on behalf of the scholarship recipient saying school materials, toiletries, small stipends are given directly to the scholarship recipient at the beginning of each school term.
Kasenye said among the scholarship conditions, secondary school students must be from feeder primary schools, needy and well performing in class while tertiary beneficiaries must also be needy and from partner schools.
She said the program is meeting some challenges in Dowa as most of the students complain of difficulties in English, inadequate learning materials in Community Day Secondary Schools and poor boarding facilities for self-boarding schools.
The district coordinator said the project is being implemented with the main objective of contributing to the development of the future leaders of Malawi by providing an end-to -end educational support for the children in the tobacco farming communities.
“The program will improve access to post-secondary education, knowledge in Sexual Reproduction and Health (SRH) and gender enhance leadership skills, joint monitoring visits to schools and psychosocial support training, among others,” said Kasenye.
She said an action research was conducted by AGE Africa in Dowa, Mchinji and Kasungu so to enhance Scholarship Beneficiary Selection, process for identifying needy students with high academic potential saying the findings have proved that the current selection process was effective in identifying needy students and not students with high academic performance potential.
In her remarks, Dowa District Council’s Director of Planning and Development Mercy Mpakule, thanked AGE Africa for being so exemplary in providing project progress reports to Dec advising all partners in the district to emulate the example set.
Dowa district has received 50 percent of Affordable Input Programme (AIP) out of its allocation but as of 6th November, 2023 the district has not yet started selling the fertilizer because of some errors that were traced in some areas.
Dowa District Council’s Chairperson Councilor Mayamiko Kambewa, said some names of beneficiaries appearing in the registers are not qualifying to appear, a development that has led to the delay of the process.
Kambewa said Agricultural Extension Development Officers (AEDOs) have gone back to their catchment areas to verify the names so that they should come up with a clean register for names that deserve to be the rightful beneficiaries.
He expressed hope that the verification of names has been done by 5th November, 2023 and selling of fertilizer to the beneficiaries will start during the week claiming that almost 50 percent fertilizer is in the district and markets have full fertilizer in stock.
The council chairperson said there have been concerns of mobile vending of fertilizer to be meeting challenges on the claims that Members of Parliament will allocate more fertilizer to the demarcated constituencies where they are optimistic to bounce back into Parliament.
“This has been resolved that 2 to 3 selling points will be open to sale AIP fertilizer in constituencies which seems not to belong to the incumbent Parliamentarian,” said Kambewa.
But, a Malawi Congress Party (MCP) diehard from Mvera in Dowa district Rodgers Kamphangala, expressed his sadness that fertilizer is in the district but names of beneficiaries and date for opening markets has not been communicated to the district describing this as a worrisome development.
Kamphangala said most of the villagers in the district are complaining of not been included as beneficiaries citing the new created Dowa Central East Constituency where only 3,000 beneficiaries will access AIP in the 2023/2024 farming season.
He said Dowa Central East covers Nalunga, Byzanzi, part of T/a Mkukula up to Tembwe observing that identifying only 3,000 beneficiaries, is a grave mistake the Government of the MCP has done to the Dowa people.
The MCP diehard said Group Mdzikometsa has 8 beneficiaries, Group Gawamadzi and the surrounding Group Village heads have 12 reminding President Dr. Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera that Dowa besides been the bedroom of the MCP, it provided thousands of votes for him to be in government.
“AIP has exposed Dowa to be not the bedroom of the MCP, many people have been left out, this will be a litmus test to President Chakwera as he is preparing to bounce back into government in 2025,” said Kamphangala.
He said AIP has proved to be useless to the Dowa people warning President Chakwera and the MCP not to take the Dowa people for granted advising three Cabinet Ministers of the district; Richard Chimwendo Banda, Halima Daudi and Sam Dalitso Kawale to rethink of the Dowa people on AIP.
Minister of Information and Digitalization Moses Kunkuyu, has commended the private sector in the country for supporting President Dr Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera trip to Saud Arabia for the Saudi Africa Summit.
Addressing the media in Lilongwe , Kunkuyu said the Chakwera Government has received overwhelming support from various companies and organizations.
Chakwera
Some of the companies which have supported the trip to Saudi Arabia include; Standard Bank, UNDP, RBM, Illovo, GIZ, EDF Adams Wholesalers, and NICO.
The ministry says the Government is aware that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was announced on Tuesday, November 7, 2023, the postponement of the 5th Arab-Africa Summit due to the current situation in Gaza.
The Summit was supposed to be held in Riyadh, the capital of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, on November 11, 2023.
During the same period, His Excellency Dr. Lazarus Chakwera is also supposed to attend the first Saudi-Africa Summit.
Kunkuyu said it must be noted that two events, the Saudi-Africa Summit and the Africa-Arab Summit were planned to take place consecutively.
“The Saudi-Africa Summit is going ahead with other African Heads of State and this is the summit that is critical to the signing of the Mangochi-Makanjira Road construction agreement,” he said.
The Mangochi-Makanjira Road will be financed by the Saudi Fund for Development.
The Saudi Fund for Development is a Saudi Arabian government agency that provides development assistance to developing countries by financing social and infrastructure projects and it is not under the Arab-Africa Summit or Arab League.
“Therefore, the President’s travel is hinged on the Saudi-Malawi relationship and cancellation of the Arab-Africa Summit changes nothing as it has no impact on the critical business to be undertaken by the President, ” he said.
Kunkuyu said the Saudi-Africa summit is crucial to development aspirations of the nation.
