KARONGA (Maravi Post)—The Malawi Revenue Authority (MRA) at Songwe border in Karonga the north of Malawi are under fire for of milking vendors who are importing maize from the neighboring Tanzania without a license, Maravi Post has learnt.This comes against a drop of maize production in the country, a development which will affect half of the population according to government projection.
Maravipost has been told that the MRA officials are taking advantage of the ignorance of the vendors on the country’s law. According to Mawazo Kasanga and Alick Mbukwa, some of the vendors who were caught importing maize without license recently were told to pay duty disproportionate to the money the vendors invest in the business.
“We thought that maize import is duty free as it is reported but surprisingly on 9 June this year, we were charged K300, 000 for 142 bags we bought from Tanzania as a group,” said Mbukwa.
“However, after we lodged our complaint it’s when they reduced the price to K250, 000, a
development which raised suspicion that officers were just stealing our money,” he added.
Kasanga said “this will affect poor Malawians because it will make us to sell the maize at higher price.”
MRA Deputy Director of Corporate Affairs, Steve Kapoloma told this reporter that “importing maize without license is illegal accordin to section 162 of the body’s Act.
However, some Malawians have asked government to stop MRA from charging duty on Maize import in order to bail out the country from the hunger situation saying “the high price we are facing is due to the development.”
Meanwhile, maize price in some markets have shot up to K12, 000 per bag of 50kgs and traders
have started hoarding the community.
The severe drought and floods in some parts of the country has resulted in poor maize harvest. In Karonga, the production of maize in 2015-2016 rainy season has dropped with 50% according to the District Agricultural Development Office (DADO) report.
