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Chaponda smiles

 

Former minister of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development George Chaponda yesterday managed a broad smile at Zomba Magistrate’s Court as three final State witnesses testified in his alleged corruption case relating to the procurement of maize from Zambia.

After being disproved last week by Minister of Information and Communications Technology Nicholas Dausi, Chaponda appeared relieved as two senior Cabinet ministers—Goodall Gondwe and Henry Mussa—testified.

But that was not all as Chaponda’s shaft of light went on even during the cross-examination of the 12th and final State witness Exton Kamkwete— the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) principal investigations officer who was also the lead investigator in the case.

Chaponda (in red necktie) getting out of the court during an earlier appearance

First to testify was Mussa—Minister of Industry, Trade and Tourism and treasurer general of the governing Democratic Progressive Party (DPP)—who said he had no knowledge of ownership of the K95 million that was seized from Chaponda’s residence in Lilongwe by ACB just before his arrest in July last year.

Asked by State lead prosecutor MacMillan Chakhala what he knew about the money Chaponda claimed belonged to DPP and was realised from a Blue Night Dinner and Dance the party organised, Mussa, who said had known Chaponda since 1963, said “he was not sure but Chaponda could have been right”.

He told the Zomba chief resident magistrate Paul Chiotcha that despite being the party’s purse keeper, he did not know whether the money belonged to DPP or to Chaponda because the party has a decentralised policy that allows each political region to fundraise for its own activities as well as hold their own bank accounts.

“In DPP, we run a decentralised policy in party finances. There are provisions that Dr Chaponda as party vice-president for the South is an overseer of the party assets, finances and all other resources at regional level, the same in Eastern Region with Honourable Bright Msaka and Honourable Hetherwick Ntaba in the Central and Honourable Goodall Gondwe in the North,” explained Mussa whose testimony lasted just 20 minutes.

Mussa’s testimony differed with Dausi, another senior DPP member, who last week denied in his testimony Chaponda’s claims that the money belonged to DPP.

Dausi, also an official government spokesperson, further denied Chaponda’s assertions that he was meant to collect the money on behalf of the DPP.

Taking his turn, Gondwe, who on several occasions in his testimony sent the packed courtroom into stitches, confirmed issuing the forex licence to Chaponda in 2004 when the accused was minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation.

During an earlier testimony held at the Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM) in Lilongwe last week, Griffin Phiri, RBM exchange control, monitoring and statistics manager, said Chaponda was not among those permitted to keep the currency that was found in his possession.

Phiri said it was only the RBM that was mandated to issue permits to keep foreign currency to any individual and there was no other parallel system where an individual can obtain the document.

In his testimony, Gondwe contradicted himself with his written statement tendered in court which indicated that he issued the licence to Chaponda in his capacity as minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation but in his oral testimony Gondwe said he was instructed by the President to issue the permit to Chaponda both in his capacity as a Cabinet minister and as an individual.

The Finance Minister, who took 58 minutes to testify while seated, could also not explicitly explain whether the licence allowed Chaponda to keep forex in his residence or at the bank, only saying “the licence allowed Chaponda to keep a reasonable amount of forex wherever he travelled.” He could not define a reasonable amount.

But commenting on Gondwe’s testimony in an interview later, lead State counsel Macmillan Chakhala said it always happens for witnesses to backtrack as such the law would have to take care of the issue “because not everything can be taken care of by facts.”

On his part, Kamkwete gave an account of what he gathered during the ACB’s investigations which started in January 2017 and took him as far as Zambia where the maize was to be purchased from.

However, the lead investigator told the court different statements from what he said during his testimony, cross-examination as well as during re-examination.

For instance, he claimed that Foster Mulumbe, former Admarc chief executive officer, had told him during an interview that Chaponda wrote him a letter instructing that he should offer Transglobe Produce Export Limited a contract to supply maize.

He also acknowledged that he had no physical evidence to form reasonable ground for which to arrest Chaponda.

But Kamkwete later withdrew both statements, saying he said so because of pressure from Chokhotho.

“I had my own stand but the counsel pressured me to answer according to his wishes. But the conduct that the former minister and Tayub [Rashid, the operations director of Transglobe Produce] demonstrated in the whole transaction is what made us to arrest them,” he said.

The court has since adjourned the matter to April 9 2017 for both parties to make their oral submissions before the court determines whether Chaponda and Tayub have cases to answer or not.

However, magistrate Chiotcha has given the defence team up to March 21 to submit written submissions to the court, and the State to respond to the same by April 4.

Chaponda is answering three charges which include giving false information to ACB, influencing a public officer to misuse his position and possession of foreign currency while Tayub is answering to the charge of persuading a public officer to misuse his position but they both denied the charges.

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