MALAWI: Archbishop Ziyaye Calls for Transparency, Accountability and Professionalism in Financial Management
The Bishop Chairman for the Catholic Secretariat, Most Rev. Tarsizio Gervazio Ziyaye, has asked Episcopal Conference of Malawi (ECM) Finance Officers to demonstrate professionalism and manage finances with integrity and make ethical decisions at all times as custodians of Catholic institutions finances.
The call was made during the opening of a five-days Executive Training in Financial Management jointly organized by AMECEA and ECM at the Catholic Secretariat in Lilongwe. The training is a continuation of the Capacity Building Training on Leadership and Management which was done in 2016.
In his remarks, Archbishop Ziyaye affirmed that, Catholic institutions must demonstrate integrity in managing finances to secure donor trust and for sustainability of these institutions.
“Catholic Institutions like the Catholic Secretariat, finance departments in our dioceses and seminaries must completely develop and maintain proper accounting systems and internal controls, ensuring transparency and accountability by allowing external auditing processes, be able to develop institutional budgets and instil budgetary controls, develop strategies for efficiently and effectively managing cash and comply with national local government tax requirements, evaluate and recommend investment proposals. These will contribute to the achievement of the church’s pastoral and social needs,” Archbishop Ziyaye said.
The Archbishop also thanked AMECEA Secretariat for partnering with United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) in offering capacity building programs which ECM has been a beneficiary. He encouraged the officers to utilize the knowledge they will gain from the training, as the bishops who entrusted them with the work of managing the finances expect them to do more.
“These programs are good because they are meant to empower agents of evangelization in the AMECEA region. As you are all aware that the church is not a maintenance church, we have to always forge ahead and therefore, you need these trainings so that you share knowledge and deepen your financial management skills for your best performance,” he said
The officers were also encouraged to be diligent in their work by identifying and mitigating every form of financial mismanagement such as corruption, fraud and theft and avoid any form of financial mismanagement by being vigilant not to be influenced by what is happening in secular institutions.
In his remarks, the Secretary General for AMECEA Secretariat, Rev. Fr. Ferdinand Lugonzo said one objective of AMECEA is to identify common problems faced by the region and think out common and possible solutions together revealing that, a research carried out in the region found out that, the Catholic religion has a lot in terms of institutions and facilities, of which most of them have been established by missionaries but most of these are run down.
“After the sad fact came out, a proposal was made that in order for us to be sustainable; we need to enhance our capacity in how we are managing our institutions and facilities. We believe that whatever is affecting one country in the region, if AMECEA puts its mind together and think out a solution, we can solve it in a better way. We believe that when our institutions have proper financial systems, better policies and right people running out financial departments then we can move ahead in a better way,” said Fr. Lugonzo
He added that the objective of AMECEA is that the officers should share knowledge and experience that they have and build the capacity that will help them have better management skills of the institutions.
The training which started on Monday 21st May and ended on Friday 25th was attended by officers from finance departments of all dioceses and other Catholic institutions in the country.
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