Malawi President Peter Mutharika has asked Malawians to change their mindset from focusing on poverty eradication and focus more on inclusive wealth-creation and self-reliance.
The President said Malawians need to work even harder to move to economic independence where they shall live, without waiting for donations or hand-outs from anyone.
The Malawi Leader was speaking in Lilongwe, Friday, when he launched the consultation process for the development of the Successor to Vision 2020, whose theme is ‘beyond inclusive envisioning to getting things done.’
The function which
brought together players in various sectors of the economy is meant to open up
discussion that will lead to the production of the country’s medium-term and
long-term development plans.
These plans are a successor to the Vision 2020 blueprint which steered the
country’s development agenda.
Speaking when he launched the consultation process, Prof. Mutharika said time
has come for Malawi to become a middle-income country that is self-sustaining.
“In the next 40 years, we need to focus more on placing the rural areas at the centre of development. As I have said before, for a long time, we have assumed that development must start in the city and spread to the rural communities.
For a long time, we have been taking people to development instead of taking development to the people,’’ said Mutharika.
Prof Mutharika
disclosed that by far, the Vision 2020 has not done much to benefit the country
and it needs to be succeeded by a plan that can address all the challenges that
Malawians are facing.
He added that his government is committed to ensuring that development is
decentralized by starting from rural communities to the townships.
“I want development to start from rural communities and feed our towns and cities. After all, people in the rural areas make up more than 80 percent of our population.
They grow the food which we eat. They generate the money which we use in delivering public services. We should turn to rural areas into centres of development in Malawi,’’ he added.
President Mutharika said the start of the consultation process will accord Malawians the opportunity to evaluate the Vision 2020, how it failed and how the nation can do better in the next 40 years.
“Our ultimate goal
should be to improve the quality of life of every Malawian – from rural areas
to towns and cities. The goal of my government is that
Every community must be food secure;
Every community must have electricity;
Every community must have good road network;
Every community must have a secondary school;
Every community must have a community technical college;
Every community must have a hospital;
Every community must have potable water supply.”
“As we develop the new plan, I want the youths and women to be heard and their
ideas included in this plan. We cannot afford to leave the youth and women
behind in the process of deciding our national development for the next 40
years.
And let me ask all youths and women in Malawi to take interest in this development plan and contribute their ideas,” advised Mutharika.
However, Mutharika
advised Malawians to change their mindset so that they should begin to develop
themselves without waiting for government to develop their communities.
During the function, heads of the Legislature, the Judicature and the Civil
Society and made affirmations to the success of the new plan which will run up
to 2063.
