By Suleman Chitera
Speaker of the Parliament of Malawi, Rt. Hon. Sameer Gaffar Suleman, MP, has expressed concern over acute shortages of office and storage space at the Parliament Building in Lilongwe, warning that the situation is undermining institutional efficiency and future staff recruitment.
The concerns followed an early morning tour of parliamentary offices conducted by the Speaker on Tuesday from 7:30am. The inspection revealed that inadequate working and storage space has emerged as Parliament’s most pressing operational challenge.
“The biggest problem we have now is office space and storage space,” said Rt. Hon. Suleman. He added that even if Parliament were to recruit additional staff immediately, the current infrastructure would not be able to accommodate them.
According to the Speaker, the space constraints are negatively affecting service delivery and limiting Parliament’s capacity to strengthen its human resources. He attributed the slow pace in resolving the problem to prolonged bureaucratic delays within government building management systems.
“I am told that some recommendations were submitted to the Building Department years ago, but up to now nothing tangible has come out of there,” Suleman said.
He indicated that he will engage the Ministry of Lands, Transport and Public Works to push for action aimed at addressing the long-standing delays and unlocking solutions to Parliament’s infrastructure challenges.
Beyond infrastructure, the Speaker also touched on staff discipline, particularly punctuality. He said he would engage parliamentary management to identify and implement measures that ensure staff report for duty on time, stressing that high work standards must be maintained at all times.
The remarks signal a renewed push by the Speaker’s office to address both structural and administrative bottlenecks at Parliament, as the institution seeks to improve efficiency and effectiveness in the discharge of its constitutional mandate.
