Government has dismissed reports that cabinet ministers are getting allowances from carrying out Covid-19 related activities in the country.   

Minister of Health Khumbize Chiponda who was responding to questions from lawmakers in Parliament said no cabinet minister in the Presidential Taskforce on Covid-19 has ever received allowance for attending Covid-19 meetings.

“We meet every week and sometimes we meet even twice a week depending on the emerging issues but all Cabinet Ministers do not get anything [allowances] and I was challenging them that they have a role to play,” said Chiponda.

She however said she is ready to resign if the ongoing forensic audit finds that she was indeed claiming Covid-19 allowances.

“We are doing audits, if indeed after the audits, after the investigations you find that I Khumbize Kandodo Chiponda used to take allowance when we were meeting here in Lilongwe, I will be the first one to resign, I am an honest person,” said Chiponda.

The Health Ministers added that the august House has powers to summon any government official over any mismanagement of public funds including the cabinet ministers.

“You know Parliament it is a very powerful institution, it has all the powers to summon anybody in this country so that it can ask if it has questions,” said Chiponda.

President Lazarus Chakwera has since told the nation, during his weekly Coronavirus update that the Covid-19 expenditure forensic audit will be ready in a month period.