Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs Sosten Gwengwe is today set to unveil the Malawi Government financial plan for the financial year 2023/24 in Parliament for consideration.

When passed into law as the Appropriation Act, the financial plan or national budget allows the government to raise and spend public funds on various projects and social services, including health, education and agriculture.

This will be the second national budget Gwengwe will be tabling in Parliament and the fourth one for the Tonse Alliance administration ushered into power through the court-sanctioned fresh presidential election held on June 23 2020.

Through national budgets, governments the world over, implement their development plans to foster economic prosperity as well as eradicate or reduce poverty. The budgets represent a contract between a government and its citizens.

During the election campaign, the Tonse Alliance, with President Chakwera as its presidential candidate and Vice-President Saulos Chilima as running mate won the hearts of many Malawians with the mouthwatering promise to take them to the Biblical Promised Land of Canaan.

But unlike Moses who in Exodus 14:13 gave hope to the Israelites by assuring them to “stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again”, the Tonse Alliance has failed to inspire hope to Malawians.

My excitement over national budgets has faded in the past decade as the financial plans have been reduced to mere talk shows or road shows where the Minister of Finance would make promises, but not deliver.

Regardless of the fact that the budget is not money per se, but a plan whose implementation resources are to be mobilised, the trend has been that the budget is dismantled during Mid-Year Budget Review. The major victim of the changes has been the development budget.

In the absence of direct budget support since the third quarter of 2013 when donors withdrew their 30 percent-plus contribution to the recurrent budget and the over 80 percent in the development budget due to poor public finance management, the going has not been easy for the Malawi Government. The situation was worsened by the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic which slowed down economic activity.

To keep going, the Malawi Government resorted to borrowing to finance the budget deficits that have hovered around a whopping K800 billion in the past three years and counting.

If ‘Canaan’ remains the destination as promised by the Tonse Alliance, Malawians will expect from Gwengwe’s budget, which realistically is the last this term as the next one will be more of an election budget, meaningful changes. Projections for revenue and growth should be realistic while loopholes in the public finance management should be sealed to save the estimated 30 percent of public funds lost to fraud and corruption annually. Expenditure control should not be mere lip-service.

Point of reflection should be the sentiments by the 44th United States President, Barack Obama, who in one of his addresses, summed it up better when he said: “A budget is more than just a series of numbers on a page. It is an embodiment of our values.”

My plea to our duty-bearers is for them to look at the national budget from the perspective that it is a contract setting out the values and aspirations of government to improve the welfare of the people.

I will repeat what I said in my pre-budget submission last year that Malawians will make it to ‘the Promised Land’ the day the leadership will start doing business unusual by taking seriously budget implementation, fighting corruption and punishing public officers who flout the Appropriations Act because they are giving people a dish they did not order.

Bring on the 2023/24 national budget.

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