Chilima case preliminary issues ruling January 12

The High Court of Malawi Financial Crimes Division has set January 12 2024 as the date when it will deliver its ruling on preliminary issues raised in the case involving Vice-President Saulos Chilima.

The Vice-President is accused of demanding and receiving an unspecified amount of money from United Kingdom-based Malawian businessperson Zuneth Sattar to influence the award of public contracts.

In a notice of ruling delivery dated December 19 2023, presiding Judge Redson Kapindu is expected to decide whether the Malawi Defence Force (MDF) should release some documents that the defence demanded as part of disclosures, among other issues.

The defence is demanding, among others, defence council minutes, but the MDF argued that the requested documents were confidential and raise security concerns.

However, the defence counter-argued that without the documents, their client may not be subjected to fair trial and, therefore, their client should be discharged from the case.

This has been one of the contentious issues in this case.

In October this year, Kapindu summoned the MDF, office of the Attorney General, the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) and defence in camera to hear submissions from both the defence and State on this matter.

Based on the submissions, the judge will make a ruling in the case which ACB is prosecuting.

Chilima is one of the suspects in cases related to Sattar in which 84 public and private individuals are alleged to have received bribes from the United Kingdom- based businessperson to influence contracts, according to a report from the ACB to the President last year.