Court restores Cashgate suspect bail
The High Court in Lilongwe has restored bail for former civil servant Steve Likhunya Phiri, the man accused of engineering the infamous Cashgate scheme that saw billions of taxpayers’ money being siphoned at Capital Hill until 2013.
Justice Ruth Chinangwa reinstated the bail, which was revoked on August 29 2022 after the accused allegedly interfered with the witness and also intimidated an accused person as he was testifying in his defence.
Likhunya’s lawyer, Chancy Gondwe, confirmed in an interview that his client’s bail was restored early this month and following the development, the accused has since been released.
Phiri was arrested on December 2 2015 as the seventh accused among the 19 suspects in the K2.4 billion Cashgate case which also involves fugitive former Ministry of Finance budget director Paul Mphwiyo.
Likhunya is believed to have applied his intelligence to beat the Integrated Financial Management Information System (Ifmis) functionality before bypassing its strength, resulting in the plundering of public funds in various ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs).
According to court documents, the alleged interference and threat that resulted in the bail revocation was on the basis of a text message Phiri had sent to the 11th accused person, Stanford Mpoola, while testifying in his defence.
Immediately after his bail revocation, Phiri applied for restoration, but the court declined on account that he would continue interfering with trial process. Since then, he had been on incarceration at Maula Prison in Lilongwe.
According to an affidavit filed by Gondwe, the accused had overstayed in custody and the circumstances that led to his bail revocation have now changed, “and Phiri no longer poses a risk to witnesses considering that trial has now been concluded”.
In April last year, the High Court said it was ready to deliver judgement on the case whose hearing took eight years, from 2014 to 2022, but the date for delivering ruling is yet to be set.
The High Court also revoked Mphwiyo’s bail in October last year following his failure to report for bail since June 2023. The court subsequently ordered his re-arrest.
The former budget director, also one of Cashgate’s alleged kingpins, is alleged to have fled the country in June last year just as the High Court earlier indicated it would deliver its ruling on the matter. The court has since forfeited his Area 43 house, which he submitted as part of his bail bond.
Out of the 19 accused persons, five have since died over the trial period while four were discharged and one was convicted and sentenced. During trial, the State paraded 35 witnesses and tendered 300 exhibits.
