Member of Parliament for Dowa East, Richard Chimwendo Banda on Tuesday attracted mixed reactions from fellow law makers when he told the House that people in Dowa use ‘witchcraft’ in resolving issues, mainly wrangles.

The parliamentarian made the remarks when was trying to move the House to push government to resolve the boundary wrangle between Dowa District Council and Lilongwe District and City Councils.

Chimwendo Banda particularly stood to com

ment on calls to review the Local Government Act of 2010 in order to address issues surrounding the boundary demarcation between the Dowa and Lilongwe and other districts.

According to him, the poor demarcation has created governance challenges requiring urgent remedies.

He faulted the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development of not showing any commitment to iron out boundary wrangles.

“Otherwise, you know we have different means and ways in Dowa of settling our own issues, including ancestral powers,” said Chimwendo Banda.

The Minister responsible, Kondwani Nankhumwa spoke in support of the calls to the review Act and promised that his Ministry will engage all stakeholders on how best to deal with the issues relating to district boundaries.

The House later authorized government to K74 billion from the International Development Association (IDA), a World Bank arm that support developing countries.

The K74 billion Drought Recovery and Resilience Loan Authorisation Bill was earlier rejected due to some “irregularities”, but law makers, mainly from opposition side agreed to pass the Bill to avoid being seen as working against the needs of the vulnerable.

Minister of Finance, Economic Planning and Development Goodall Gondwe thanked the parliamentarians for allowing the government to borrow the money, which he said, part of it will be channeled towards the procurement of maize while the other half will be used to build resilience in the vulnerable communities.