STATUS OF PASSPORT PRINTING
As a mouth-piece of the voiceless citizenry, and in exercise of its governance watchdog role, the Centre for Democracy and Economic Development Initiatives (CDEDI) zeroed in on the current passport crisis in the country and hereby shares its key findings as follows:
To start with, it is important to say that President Lazarus Chakwera has not only lied to the world but, also, proved himself to be a security threat to the nation by hoodwinking Malawians into believing that the country’s passport printing system has been hacked, and that the hackers are demanding a ransom.
In other words, we have reasons to believe that the President disguised Techno Brain as a hacker, and further disguised the GIT’s maintenance contract fee as ransom in order to earn himself and his administration public sympathy.
Background
Malawians may wish to know that on March 22, 2019 the Malawi Government engaged Techno Brain on a Build, Operate and Transfer (BOT) basis where the company used its money to build the system for printing
passports on the understanding that it would recover its money through passport fees and later hand over the operations of the system to the Malawi Government after three years. Important to note here is that passports are
not printed using Other Recurrent Transaction (ORT) but money that people pay when they apply for passports.
At the expiry of the BOT contract, Techno Brain handed over everything to the Malawi Government. However, for purposes of the smooth running of the system, Techno Brain recommended a Dubai-based company, known as
GIT, as a maintenance consultant. Apparently, this was done in view of the need for replacement of the system’s parts, including servicing.
The above is now the genesis of the current crisis. Some well-known Malawi Congress Party-connected ICT gurus, including officials from e-Government, Malawi Communications Regulatory Authority (MACRA) and National
Registration Bureau (NRB), against technical advice from internal ICT team at the Immigration Department, bypassed Techno Brain and GIT and tampered with the system in an effort to run away from paying licence fees.
Investigations show that the system was tampered with through the Lilongwe saver office at Malawi Postal Corporation Training Centre, along the Paul Kagame road where the Department of Immigration and Citizen
Services headquarters is earmarked to be located. When their attempts proved futile, they invited a Techno Brain team which came for assessment, hence the public notice by the Department of Immigration titled
‘MAINTENACE OF PASSPORT ISSUANCE SYSTEM’ dated January 28, 2024.
According to the assessment report, the Techno Brain team recommended to government that they needed eight days to bring back the system and printing could resume in Lilongwe and Blantyre. To be followed by Mzuzu
and Mangochi. The Techno Brain team said all it needed was a mandate to start working to recover the system, but the MCP ICT team acted wiser and convinced government that they did not need Techno Brain’s assistance,
hence the government has not granted Techno Brain mandate to recover the system.
THE HACKING NARRATIVE
The growing public rage and the ever-inquisitive citizens forced the MCP ICT gurus who were still trying to apply the try-and-error tactics to recover the system, to use the agenda setting theory to churn the hacking narrative,
which is senseless and dangerous.
Unfortunately, President Chakwera has been caught lying under oath! Forget about the report, here is why Malawians should be living in fear:
By publicly informing the nation that the Immigration system has been hacked, the President has played in the hands of professional hackers. In fact, the President has just told the world: “Here we are, a helpless and
vulnerable nation whose systems are susceptible to hacking!” But the hacking narrative also begs some serious question:
- The mode of communication with the hackers to demand the so-called ransom, assuming it is in person, why not unleash State apparatus to apprehend the messenger if they are within the country? If they are elsewhere in the world, why can’t government seek assistance from governments of those countries to apprehend them? Assuming they are communicating via WhatsApp call or e-mails, is it that difficult to use modern technology to trace them?
- Further question to the above would be; as a nation, have we failed to trace the hackers due to lack of expertise? If that is the case, are we safe as a country? If it is out of lack of interest, why is government not interested to flush out the hackers in the first place?
- The other question would be: Is President Chakwera telling Malawians that as huge and important the Passport Issuance System is, it doesn’t have backup servers elsewhere? For starters, any computer-based system, no matter how small it might be, has a virtual backup system, and this was one of Techno Brain’s expected deliverables. To hear that the system crushed and loss of data occurred is a huge mockery, especially for the kind of operations we are talking about.
Malawians may recall that between 2018 and 2019 one of the commercial banks in the country had its system hacked, but it was up and running within an hour because they had servers in Lilongwe, Mzuzu and in the country they had procured the system.
Servers are important because no matter how watertight a system can be, it is prone to hacking for, among others, the following reasons:
- Malice
- Theft and or ransom
- Frustration from the super users
- Natural disasters and calamities
Now the critical question President Chakwera should answer is: Out of the 20 million plus Malawians, did we not have skilled ICT personnel that could advise on the need for the Immigration Department to have redundant servers in place?
This is why we at CDEDI, on behalf of Malawians, conclude that the President lied before the House of records the day he appeared in Parliament and, among other questions, he was asked to explain the passport crisis.
WHERE ARE WE NOW?
Malawi is at crossroads, the MCP ICT team is holding the country at ransom. But empty threats from the President won’t work. The system is ours since it was handed over to government, but government is trying to dodge user licence fees to GIT. Government is now accusing GIT for demanding user fees, which President Chakwera has described as ransom, after some so-called local ICT experts tampered with the system to bypass both GIT and Techno Brain. The noble thing to do is for the Tonse Alliance administration to swallow its pride and let Techno Brain do the needful that will allow Malawians acquire passports as and when they need them.
OTHER IMPORTANT INFORMATION
Malawians may wish to know that all this is stemming from an election campaign promise to make a passport affordable, at K14,000, down from the current K93,000. As this campaign promise was being made, passport printing, according to the initial contract of 800,000 books, was pegged at $76 each translating into US$60.8 million about MK108 billion. Malawians may remember that the cost of $76 per passport was used to cost the project with deliverables. Techno Brain was requested through the office of Attorney General to inform the country the cost of a single booklet, but they declined. It simply meant that if the passport fee was to be reduced as promised, government should have subsidised the fee.
The three-year e-Passport project had deliverables attached to it as follows:
- Digitalization of the registry.
- Digitalisation and networking of all embassies to cut on costs for sending
documents through DHL, and fraud where passports were manipulated. - Printing facilities at Chileka and Kamuzu International Airports.
- Disaster recovery site
- Airport forensic laboratories
- Training of personnel
- Study tours
- Provision of five Toyota Hilux Twin cabs
- Upgrade current passport system
- Provision of additional printers
- Stock management system
- Provision of cctv cameras
- Enhance access control of building and printing rooms
- Protective gear for printing rooms
As it stands, the Immigration Department Director General (DG) General Charles Kalumo owes Malawians an explanation or two, as to whether all the deliverables were met. If not, he needs to explain why that is the case after full payment of contract money was paid.
OUR STAND
President Chakwera is shielding the trio that is holding this country atransom, by allowing them to feed the nation lies that they will be able to run the system, through bypassing GIT and Techno Brain, at the expense of
people requiring to travel for medical attention, business and school.
The system requires a disaster recovery site, which was among Techno Brain’s deliverables as per provision of the expired contract.
The three weeks the President has promised to have the system up and running is a clear indication that he trusts the so-called ICT gurus that have failed for the past four weeks, and our fear is that this will be a fruitless
effort, likely to end in tears for us.The said 21 days is too long a wait when Techno Brain had suggested for eight working days, especially given that some people have waited for their passports for ages.
WAYFORWARD
Malawians have a right to know who did what; therefore, CDEDI implores the relevant committee in the august House to immediately call for a live public inquiry over the matter, where Techno Brain would also be heard.
By public convenience, the government should immediately recall able hands that have full knowledge and skills of the said ‘hacked system’ but were unceremoniously interdicted, posted and/or transferred, to go back
and solve this national crisis, and save the country from the embarrassment government has pushed it into.
Meanwhile, the seven (7) working days’ ultimatum stands! CDEDI will mobilise Malawians to conduct peaceful demonstrations, protesting the 21 days and forcing a public inquiry on the same.
Sylvester Namiwa
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
