By Benjamin Chisale
On Wednesday,March 29,2023 Centre for social concern,a social and research arm of the Roman catholic in Malawi,facilitated an interface meeting which involved Area Development Committees(ADC’s) from sub tradition authority Bwananyambi and office of water and development in Mangochi.
The meeting was held at Holiday Motel in Mangochi.
The central theme of the meeting was give a platform to community of Bwananyambi to interact with water development office on concerns of not accessing safe water in the area.
One of ADC’s chair,from Bwananyambi 1 ward Flora Jackson told the duty bearer that things are worse in their area and they need more boreholes.
“we need safe water,we need more boreholes, imagine,ratio of boreholes in our area is one to 150people, access to safe drinking water is everyone’s challenge” lamented a concerned citizen.
In his response,Mangochi District Water supervisor Hassan Maluwa admitted the fault and outlined that inadequate funding to his office has been a major challenge but was quick to mention that such kind of projects do depend on development partners,he further promised the community to consult available partners to construct some boreholes in the area.
The facilitator of this interface meeting,Centre for social concern recommended the community of Bwananyambi for demanding transparency and accountability on funds that are meant for developmental projects.
“People have the right to access safe drinking water,early this year we had an outbreak of cholera this can be a root cause of outbreak,this prompted us to intervene that people need to have a full access of safe water, we are happy that the outcome of this meeting has gave an a warning shot to members of parliament not to politicize developmental projects”
The interface gave an opportunity for citizens of sub traditional Authority Bwananyambi to interact with duty bearer from the office of Water Development in Mangochi remarked the centre’s programme officer Benard Mphepo.