ACB questions Kachali over Cashgate

Vice-President Khumbo Kachali  on Friday appeared at the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) office in Lilongwe where he was questioned in connection with the theft of government money at Capital Hill now dubbed Cashgate.

Deputy ACB director general Reyneck Matemba confirmed in an interview that the bureau invited the Vice-President on Monday to come for an ‘interview’ but he was not under arrest.

Kachali arrived at the ACB offices in Lilongwe just before 11am, without the usual pomp accorded to a vice-president of Malawi, in one of two vehicles alongside his bodyguards and personal assistants.

He was in the building for more than an hour before he left at 12.35PM.

Matemba said ACB wrote the Vice-President’s office on Monday requesting to meet him in “the on-going investigations” into the loss of billion from government coffers.

“We received confirmation from his office that he would be coming at 11am this morning. This is part of the ongoing investigations into Cashgate. We are seeking clarifications which would assist us with other information we have come across. It is not only him we invited to the bureau,” he said.

In an interview after leaving the building, Kachali said he appeared before ACB as a law-abiding citizen but refused to divulge the purpose of his visit.

“It was a fruitful meeting. I’ve liked the meeting. I was invited to the ACB and the Second Citizen is the most law-abiding citizen who respects the Constitution,” he said.

When asked if his grilling at ACB was connected to his fallout with President Joyce Banda, Kachali said: “You’re entitled to your opinion.”

Kachali fell out of favour with the PP administration in February after the President opted for Trade Minister Sosten Gwengwe as her runningmate during the election on Tuesday.

The Vice-President further irked the party after he publicly endorsed his former party Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate Peter Mutharika as presidential candidate during a rally in Mzimba on Monday.

Kachali later denied he has joined DPP but that he remains an ordinary member of PP.

PP attempts to stop him from contesting as MP for the Mzimba South West seat on the party’s ticket have failed after it withdrew a case on Thursday in which it sought an injunction to stop the poll, saying it was not obtainable in view of the Presidential and Parliamentary Elections Act which stops granting of court orders 14 days before elections.

Billions of kwacha of taxpayers’ money has been stolen from Account Number one through dubious transactions by civil servants and businesspersons since 2012.

The matter came to a head after the then budget director in the Ministry of Finance Paul Mphwiyo was shot in September in a crime the law enforcing agencies link to the Cashgate.

Since then several arrests have been made and several cases connected to the matter are pending in courts.