nec speech

National Executive Speech

The Honourable Deputy Minister of Education, Samuel Kaphuka The Chairman of SCOM Board of Trustees, and your fellow Trustees, SCOM NEC Members, The Principal of this College, The SCOM Acting General Secretary, SCOM Sectional Committee Members, Representatives of Churches and other Para-Church Organisations, SCOM Associates, Distinguished Invited Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen.

I greet you all in the wonderful name of Jesus Christ, our Saviour and Lord First of all, I would like to welcome you to this very important gathering in the history of SCOM. Please feel very welcome and enjoy every event of this Anniversary. A special welcome goes to our Guest of Honour, the Honourable Minister of Education for accepting our invitation for him to grace this occasion with his presence amidst his busy schedule. Honourable Minister, SCOM does not take your presence for granted, this shows the commitment which the Government of Malawi and you personally have in the development of the youth of this country.

A special welcome is also extended to our brother Calisto Odede, the representative of IFES (International Fellowship for Evangelical Students) to which SCOM is affiliated. Calisto, feel welcome and enjoy every moment of this Anniversary and your stay in Malawi.

Honourable Minister, Ladies and Gentlemen, I sincerely thank the Lord God Almighty for His enormous faithfulness to the Ministry of SCOM and for seeing this Ministry through for a good 40 years. May to Him and Him alone be all the glory and honour. God has and indeed will remain our Strength and Hope, hence the theme of this anniversary: God’s faithfulness, Our strength and Our Hope!

Honourable Minister, Ladies and Gentlemen, SCOM is mainly aimed at character building of students for effective and efficient service of the society. It is aimed at transforming and moulding the lives of students into responsible citizens using the Word of God. SCOM believes that the basis of a good nation depends on the training provided to the youth of today, and that this can be achieved only if such training is based upon God's Word.

Honourable Minister, Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen, for the past 40 years, SCOM has strived to fulfill its aims of creating role-models from students and I am delighted to report that this has largely been achieved. Today, there is ample evidence that lives of many students who were problematic in schools have been transformed through the Ministry of SCOM. Indeed in schools many students who are in positions of leadership, such as school prefects, are active SCOM members. Most importantly, today many people in positions of leadership in both public and private sector and religious organisations have their roots in SCOM.

Honourable Minister, Ladies and Gentlemen, SCOM appreciates the support which it gets from Government generally, and the Ministry of Education, in particular. SCOM acknowledges that the students it serves are under the school rules and ensures that its programmes are always in line with those of the school. As such the Government, with its policy of freedom of worship has allowed SCOM to operate in schools freely. During the several Conferences which SCOM holds in schools almost after every school term, some schools have provided accommodation to SCOM at reasonable rates. In addition, the Government has recently appointed the SCOM Acting General Secretary, Mr. Patrick Kaudzu to be a member of the National Youth Council of Malawi. All this is evidence that the relationship of SCOM and Government is in order and that the roles of the two institutions are complementary.

However, this notwithstanding, Honourable minister, Ladies and Gentlemen, SCOM is not satisfied with its achievements so far, it feels it can do more and better that this. SCOM intends to participate fully in meetings, conferences, or workshops discussing issues of HIV/IAIDS, moral degradation, corruption and the like at which SCOM can effectively contribute solutions. SCOM believes that it has some answers to these problems. Unfortunately SCOM is generally not invited to such forums. Secondly, let me report that there are some schools which either completely bar or make the operation of a SCOM branch at their school unnecessarily difficult. Thirdly, some public educational institutions demand very exorbitant charges from the use of the school facilities such as hostels or halls, as if SCOM is not a Government complementary partner in youth development,

Honourable minister, Ladies and Gentlemen, SCOM would sincerely appreciate if Government would intervene and consider completely waiving such charges for SCOM Conferences, so that SCOM would be responsible for only consumables such as food, water, electricity, labour and security costs. This would also assist to lower the students' contributions to such meetings and would in turn enable many students to attend the gatherings and benefit from them.

In conclusion, Honourable Minister, Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen, on behalf of SCOM, I would like once again to express my sincere thanks to you for sparing your variable time to come and attend this meeting, At this juncture I ask you to address the gathering and open the Anniversary celebrations.

Thank you very much and may God bless you.

Samuel Malitoni