During a national address on Tuesday, President Chakwera made a candid statement that he is not holding his position to serve any party, a cabinet minister or the alliance, but Malawians in his quest to develop the country.

Chakwera said he will not keep ministers who cannot complement his efforts toward the development of the country, arguing some ministers are corrupt, incompetent and negligent.

“And speaking of cabinet, I want to make it clear that I will be announcing other changes in due course, because the time for keeping people as ministers without any noticeable contribution or difference they are making to my efforts to transform government performance in delivering better public services to Malawians is past.

“The time for keeping people as ministers who allow incompetence, corruption, and wastage to happen on their watch simply because the people doing it are their friends or members of their parties or alliance partners is past,” he declared.

Reacting to the president’s sentiments, Tonse Alliance spokesperson Kamuzu Chibambo said the address will help in addressing the needs of Malawians as scribed in the alliance’s agenda.

“I cannot agree with the president more. Without the people, we are irrelevant, without satisfying the interest of the people of Malawi, then it is a useless alliance. The alliance must be about the welfare of the people of Malawi,” he said.

Buttressing Chibambo’s sentiment, Malawi Congress Party spokesperson Reverend Maurice Munthali said it is high time people knew that no party owns the president and that his duty is to serve Malawians.

“Every party must know that they don’t own the president singularly. They only produce the president and that president becomes the servant of everybody else,” he said.

He adds, “When the president goes to his party and addresses his party, then yes, he is a party president but when he speaks to the nation they let him look like a statesman.”

However, political analyst George Phiri thinks the president should ensure that all those that are suspected of involvement in corruption should be prosecuted and justice let to prevail if he is to gain back people’s trust.

“It is unfortunate that after he came into power, we have not seen many cases of corruption being prosecuted. People lost trust because of that; he became a president of speech and not action and what can change the lives of Malawians is not the speech but action,” he said.

In the speech, President Chakwera announced that he had fired Minister of Agriculture Lobin Lowe and his deputy Madalitso Kambauwa Wirima over the misappropriation of K750 million meant for fertilizer procurement in the Affordable Input Programme, adding that more changes in government would follow.