Board chair of the National Local Government Finance Committee Commissioner Richard Chapweteka has urged Blantyre District Council to ensure that service to its residents is raised to the expectation of its people.

Chapweteka said this during a consultative meeting between the board and the district council in Blantyre. He said time had come for all players on the ground to move towards the same direction so that residents of the council also benefit from developmental projects funded by the Governance to Enable Service Delivery (GESD) as is happening to other councils.

Chapweteka then warned the council to desist from reference to theories on their failure to access the first phase disbursement of the GESD resources.

The Board chair said all councils are assessed using similar tools in terms of financial compliance and performance urging it to focus on its efforts to do well as there was no room to change or provide different opinions than those on the ground.

In her remarks, the chairperson for Blantyre District Council, Councilor Sigere Pemba bemoaned issues which had led to her council’s failure to access the GESD resources.

‘I hope that this meeting will help us get positioned and ready to effectively work for the expectation of our people. We hope too that though we failed to qualify for the LAPA results can be remedied’.

The consultative meeting targets four councils namely Thyolo DC, Blantyre DC, Mchinji DC and Nkhotakota DC which failed to meet the minimum access conditions to trigger qualification to access the added funds for the district development plans through the GESD project.