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Batatawala tops govt claims list

 Four businesspersons are claiming about K429 billion from government in compensations, representing around 22 percent of the K2 trillion total claims that Attorney General (AG) Thabo Chakaka Nyirenda is currently fighting.

In an interview yesterday, Nyirenda said the top four highest claims include, at the pinnacle, that of businessperson Abdul Karim Batatawala, who is claiming about K250 billion through 20 business entities.

At this rate, Batatawala alone accounts for at least 12.5 percent of the total claims.

The AG said: “Batatawala’s claims in total are about K250 billion. So he has got over 20 companies and most of them have got cases against government.

Batatawala with his lawyer Henry Phoya at court on Monday

“So, when we are talking about Batatawala, we are talking about his companies.”

Ramchand Hashmatrai is second on the list with his land claim of about K131 billion, a claim that the High Court in Blantyre on Monday stopped following the AG’s challenge.

Nyirenda said businessperson Shiraz Ferreira of SF International is claiming an estimated K30 billion while local businessperson Leston Mulli of Mulli Brothers Limited is claiming about K18 billion.

The K 429 billion compensation claims by the four businesspersons, of which three are Malawians of Asian origin, is one and a half times the proposed budget for the Ministry of Health at K283.57 billion.The AG said the four businesspersons’ claims exclude interests and that almost all of them have more than one compensation claim.

He further said his office receives new claims each passing day, with most of them coming from police on false imprisonment, land disputes, construction projects, procurement and Malawi Rural Electrification Project (Marep). Nyirenda noted that most of the claims are exaggerated.

“At the same time we are receiving more claims, at the same time we have got cases that have been dismissed in our favour,” said Nyirenda.

Among others, the AG is currently fighting a $7.1 million (about K5.8 billion) bill in interest claims that Ferreira charged government for delayed payment after supplying military hardware to Malawi Defence Force (MDF) between 2012 and 2017.

Ferreira claims he supplied the said military equipment at $30 million in two chunks, but the interest is due to delayed payment and legal collection fees.

In early December 2021, Nyirenda indicated that compensation claims he was handling had jumped from about K800 billion in September 2021to over K2 trillion in December 2021.

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