The president of Malawi, Peter Mutharika, has reaffirmed his commitment to the Commonwealth, pledging to support its initiatives on youth, women’s empowerment, entrepreneurship, child marriage, domestic violence and climate change.
The president of Malawi, Peter Mutharika has reaffirmed his commitment to the Commonwealth, pledging to support its initiatives on promoting youth, empowering women, building entrepreneurship, ending child marriage, tackling domestic violence and responding to climate change.
Mr Mutharika met with Commonwealth Secretary-General Patricia Scotland at the beginning of her three-day official visit to Malawi. The president said his country has benefited greatly from its long engagement with the Commonwealth. Support to the country has included observing elections, boosting trade and working with traditional leaders to end early and forced marriage.
The Secretary-General arrived in Malawi on 27 April, following a mission to Lesotho.
“It really warms my heart to hear the president speak so highly of the Commonwealth and declare his endorsement of our programmes. Our collaboration with Malawi has yielded strong results in areas such as trade facilitation, debt management and putting a stop to the scourge of early and forced marriage. The traditional leaders we worked with were able to annul hundreds of forced marriages,” said Secretary-General Scotland.
“President Mutharika is a great champion for the Commonwealth and with his affirmation of support and commitment, we are now in a position to take our engagement to the next level, ensuring Malawi can take full advantage of ongoing initiatives such as our climate finance access hub. This will help the country to access funding to tackle climate change which has contributed to severe drought and a food crisis in the country,” she added.
Commonwealth Secretary-General will continue to meet with officials today and will deliver a speech at the launch of Malawi’s National Dialogue on Anti-Corruption.
