Following the dropping down of the Malawi Kwacha against the United States Dollar, the cost of living has been forced to go higher making it difficult for most malawians to make ends meet. Recently, it was the University of Malawi facing closure where two of its constituent Colleges of The Polytechnic and Chancellor college were closed indefinetely.

The closerue emanated from the fact that the students were demanding the Malawi Governemnt to consider increasing their upkeep allowance by at least 50% and reduce the tuition fees that the parallel students pay arguing that the current upkeep allowance is not able to sustgain them and the tution fee is higher for most needy students to afford. This came just a few months after the civil servants in Malawi had taken to the streets forcing the government to revise their perks as to suit the current cost of living, a move that ended up seeing the government taking an urgent action.

As the tune has been going, the week begging Monday, May 17, 2013 was for the workers in the Asian shops in Limbe CBD to raise their concern over lower perks. The employees of the Asian shops in Limbe CBD were asking their employers to increase their Salaries arguing that the current rates are not in line with that required to help a person survive in view of the current economic status that Malawi has.

'These Asians do pay us on a weekly basis and the current rate is at MK 3, 000.00 (About US$ 9.11 per week). In addition to that, we get a house allowance of MK 3, 000.00 as well, but on a monthly basis. As you can see, we are having problems to survive on this bearing in mind that we ought to fend for our basic needs,' grieved one of the employees who pleaded to be anonymous in an interview.

Currently, a bag of maize is already at MK 5, 000.00 and people have just harvested. Bread is going at MK 250.00. A One-KG packet of sugar is going at MK 480.00 on average. The transport fares are just being hiked where it needs one to spend MK 1, 000.00 per week on average since one route cost MK 100.00/Day. The interview also revealed that these employees have no further benefits apart from the house allowance they get of which they are complaining of it being insufficient.

Having had a number of futile meetings with their employers to have their perks revized, the employyees simply thought of not working and Limbe CBD experience a change in its routine deleberations. A gang of angry employees was moving around to close forcefully every shop that was open as it was deemed going against their appeal and efforts.

Business had stopped and many peole that came to Limbe on Monday and Tuesday were forced to return home empty handed because there was no shop that was allowed to do business as usual. On tuesday afternoon, a team of the Employers met the representatives of the employees where a promise was made to have the employees concerns considered.

One of the agreements was to raise their weekly allowance from MK 3, 000.00 to MK 4, 000.00 and the house allowance from MK 3, 000.00 to MK 4, 000.00. This means that if the promise is going to be kept, the new payment is going to come to a total of MK 20, 000.00/month. The employees were quick to raise their fear as to whether the promise made is going to be adhered to and they promised to once again shun their work to the point they will see a practical change.

NB: MK is at 329.457 against a US$ (22/06/2013)