Malawi's government has been accused of misleading the public over a scheme to build 450 schools, clinics and vocational centres, after officials described the project as costing taxpayers nothing -- only for the fine print to suggest otherwise. Behind the deal sits Zunaid Moti, the South African businessman whose Moti Group is bankrolling the venture alongside Jindal Power Group.
At a glitzy launch in Gaborone on 6 September, Second Vice-President Enock Chihana announced Malawi would receive 300 schools, 100 clinics and 50 vocational centres from the African Hero Foundation "at zero cost to governments."
But a brochure from the foundation itself says payments are simply "activated only after delivery" -- meaning government pays later, not never.
Who is Zunaid Moti?
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Moti is no stranger to controversy. The South African tycoon, who chairs the Moti Group and has positioned himself as African Hero's chief financier, has cultivated a reputation as a dealmaker willing to move fast in markets where others hesitate -- and as someone whose ventures tend to attract scrutiny as quickly as headlines.
Critics point to a pattern: big announcements, bigger numbers, and a habit of framing entire countries as test cases for schemes still being worked out in practice. That habit is on full display here -- Moti himself has described Botswana as the "first proof point" for the model, with Malawi "already showing us what comes next."
For a continent that has heard plenty of grand infrastructure pledges evaporate, being cast as someone else's experiment is not an obviously comforting position.
The Botswana warning
Malawi isn't the guinea pig -- Botswana got there first, and it isn't going well. A project Moti's foundation originally costed at P3.6 billion for 100 schools has reportedly swollen to P20 billion over 20 years, prompting opposition calls for a parliamentary inquiry and demands from public sector unions for full disclosure of the deal's "financial, legal and contractual" terms, including who actually ends up owning the buildings.
The economics
Economist Marvin Banda cuts to the chase: "If zero upfront cost simply means Malawi starts paying later, then we have not eliminated the cost; we've moved it from today's budget into tomorrow's." With Malawi's public debt already above 90% of GDP, that's not a technicality -- it's the whole question.
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The ghost in the room
This isn't Malawi's first brush with a suspiciously generous foreign benefactor. In 2022, then President Lazarus Chakwera announced $6.8 billion in "free" infrastructure from the Bridgin Foundation that turned out to be unfinanced, unverified, and ultimately abandoned -- leaving government quietly footing the bill for a mess it didn't create.
Public finance specialist Dalitso Kubalasa isn't taking chances this time: "Malawi cannot afford another Bridgin Foundation... let's verify, cost, and scrutinise like our budget depends on it, because it does."
The bottom line
Nobody disputes Malawi needs schools and clinics. What's in dispute is whether a scheme fronted by a businessman already facing hard questions in Botswana, and whose "zero cost" pitch doesn't survive contact with his own foundation's brochure, is the vehicle Malawi should be trusting to deliver them.
Malawians, still waiting to see the actual contract, may be about to find out the hard way.
