Blantyre, December 21: Malawi Immigration Department says in the year 2014 the department has collected revenues of close to K3.5 billion, a figure it says it’s not far from the revenues the department collected in 2013.
Chief Immigration Officer Dr. Hudson Mankhwala said this in Blantyre on Saturday night during the end of year party the department organized for its staff.
Mankhwala said the year just ending was fruitful to the department thanks to the government’s support it has been rendering to the department.
“I can happily say here that the year 2014 was very fruitful to immigration department since we have managed to achieve what we were expected to do.
“The department collected K3.5 billion through its services it offers to the public. However we are discussing with government to give additional funding to our department as doing so could also raise the revenue in the coming year.
“Immigration as a department receives K873 million per year but it seems the funding is not fully catering for our needs in a whole year. Approximately our department needs K1.3 billion to work well in a year,” said Mankhwala.
Mankhwala added that while the department has registered some successes, there are also challenges the department faced in the just ending year.
He said the challenges include continued manual operations in other immigration services like permits, visas and other services.
He further cited lack of adequate funding, inadequate housing for officers and lack of adequate operational vehicles as other challenges.
Dr. Mankhwala then said in the forthcoming year, the department is planning to recruit 500 additional officers and in the next three years to come the department is planning to recruit 1500 officers.
On the reforms being taken by government, Mankhwala said it has helped the department a lot by among others opening passport processing in Lilongwe and next year the department is expected to open another passport printing office in Mzuzu.
The Chief Immigration officer has since urged officers to continue working hard in order to achieve government goals.
During the Christmas end of year party, the department honoured some of its 2014 retired officers.
