By Wezzie Gausi:
High Court of Malawi Financial Crimes Division Judge Redson Kapindu will this morning deliver a ruling on whether further disclosures should be submitted in the corruption case involving State Vice President Saulos Chilima.
According to court documents, the ruling was initially slated for this afternoon but had to be shifted to this morning.
In the case, Chilima is accused of receiving an unspecified sum of money from United Kingdom-based businessperson Zuneth Sattar to allegedly influence public contracts in his [Sattar’s] favour.
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According to a statement signed by the court’s assistant registrar, the matter will be heard in an open court in Lilongwe.
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The ruling is expected to settle the heated contest between Chilima’s lawyers and those representing the Malawi Defence Force (MDF).
The defence is seeking more disclosures from the State but the MDF is objecting to the request on grounds of relevance and national security.
The disclosures in question include minutes of the Defence Council Meeting held on October 16 2020 authorising the procurement of armoured personnel carriers (APCs) and a memorandum of March 2021 from the MDF to President Lazarus Chakwera seeking authorisation to procure APCs from Malachite FZE, a company linked to Sattar, using the single sourcing method.
Earlier on, the MDF refused to submit the documents to the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB), citing national security issues.
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But on January 12 2024, Kapindu ordered the MDF to provide these documents, an order the military complied with.
Based on his January 12 2024 judgement, the judge is expected to decide on two key issues; first on whether the information is, indeed, sensitive from a national security perspective that it may not be used as evidence in the court in any form; and, secondly, the extent to which such evidence is relevant, if at all, to the defence case.
Chilima was arrested in November 2022.
He was named among 84 individuals who are alleged to have received bribes from Sattar, according to a report the ACB submitted to President Chakwera in 2022.
