Chakwera cancels OPEC, Commonwealth trips
President Dr Lazarus Chakwera has cancelled his physical participation at OPEC fund for development forum and Common wealth conference this month
Announcing this minister of foreign affairs Nancy Tembo said Chakwera has delegated Minister of Energy Ibrahim Matola and Minister of Water and Sanitation Abida Mia to represent him at OPEC conference in Australia
Tembo said the minister of foreign affairs will represent the president at commonwealth conference in Rwanda as part of austerity measure of cutting to 3 international trips for all government and political officials.
On Chinese national insulting Malawians Tembo said Police and foreign affairs ministry are investigating the matter
“We have asked China to arrest the culprit and advised Malawians not to entertain suspicious people,” Tembo
In his remarks Minister of finance and economic development Sosten Gwengwe said the president’s cancellation of his physical participation at OPEC and Commonwealth conferences will serve 268 million kwacha
Gwengwe proposed the use of electronic receipts by traffic police officers as part of austerity measures
However he said the president will travel to Democratic Republic of Congo in August to handover the chairmanship of SADC to president of that country
Gwengwe emphasized that Chakwera will be attending physically very critical conferences which are very beneficial to Malawi
He added that the audit report for misreporting on Malawi’s credit will be released on Friday 17th June.
Gwengwe added that Reserve Bank of Malawi submitted a debt plan to Ministry of finance which will be forwarded to International Monetary Fund
