When Presidential Orders meet reality

President Peter Mutharika left the country last Sunday for South Africa on what the Chief Secretary to the President and Cabinet, Justin Saidi, described as a “private visit”. But just hours before boarding his flight at Kamuzu International Airport in Lilongwe, Mutharika signed something far less private — an Executive Order mandating the provision and use of sanitation and hygiene facilities in workplaces, schools, markets, bus depots, recreational centres and other public spaces. From now on, all such places, whether public or private, must install and maintain proper waste disposal systems, including functional rubbish bins.

This order immediately took effect on the same day March 1 2026, and extends to densely populated township markets in Bangwe, Chirimba, Ndirande, Biwi, Kawale, Mchesi, Chibavi, Chiputula and Zolozolo. These areas are among those that have long carried the burden of sanitation risks and recurring waterborne infections linked to environmental neglect and accumulated refuse. But we all know that it is one thing to issue orders from the State House or Capital Hill, and quite another to confront the question of capacity.

And the real test of this order is whether the State has the machinery, funding and institutional strength to translate instruction into action. For decades, waste collection in Malawi has been uneven not because citizens prefer disorder, but because the public systems meant to sustain public cleanliness are chronically under-resourced. We have seen this in some townships, where rubbish bins exist only as symbols placed along streets, but they are not emptied for days, sometimes weeks or months.

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In other trading centres, bins are absent altogether, forcing residents into unsafe disposal practices. And our city, town and district councils have struggled to manage such scenarios. For example, just three years ago, Blantyre City Council operated with roughly six waste-collection vehicles against a requirement of about twelve and had only 44 skip bins instead of the estimated 100 needed for effective coverage.

Lilongwe City Council reportedly had two consistently reliable refuse vehicles out of a fleet of six and about eleven skip bins serving multiple markets and strategic points where at least a hundred would have been appropriate. Mzuzu also operated with one functioning refuse vehicle and about twelve skip bins out of the twenty-seven required for efficient operation. Zomba faced similar constraints.

These figures reveal a persistent pattern across councils, which have often cited chronic funding shortages whenever sanitation performance is questioned. The complaints are not new; they reflect a structural imbalance between the responsibilities assigned to local authorities and the resources available to fulfil them. It is, therefore, important for the government to ensure that while it instruct markets, schools and workplaces to maintain proper waste disposal, councils equally possess functioning garbage trucks, adequate funding and consistent fuel supplies to collect what those bins will inevitably gather.

Maybe that’s why the directive is notably silent on the question of capacity. But waste management infrastructure, fleet procurement, operational financing and supervisory discipline within councils remain fundamentally governmental responsibilities, resting with the State of which Mutharika himself is chief steward. Otherwise the consequences of poor sanitation and hygiene are predictable.

Waste spills onto pavements, clogs drainage channels, contaminates rivers and quietly fuels disease outbreaks. It is built by trucks that move, fuel that flows, workers who are paid, bins that are emptied, and councils that are resourced to perform the ordinary but essential work of keeping streets alive.

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