Remarks by ACB lead prosecutor Chrispin Khunga in the Vice President Saulos Chilima corruption case that the bureau does not trust the Malawi Police Service have put the law enforcers and the graft busting body on a collision course.
The development follows a bail variation ruling in which Justice Redson Kapindu said he refused to join the ACB on their journey of mistrusting the men in uniform.
Sources from Area 30 say the Office of the Inspector General has this morning officialy engaged ACB Director General Martha Chizuma over the issue, stressing that “it creates a bad precedence and unnecessarily antagonises the two government institutions instead of working together in the fight against corruption.”
Our source said the ACB was yet to respond to the complaint but indicated that Area 30 feels ACB is infantalizing the fight against corruption, a task that requires collaboration by government agencies.
During one of the court appearences on 19 July, Khunga repeteadly told the court that the only way for ACB to be certain that the Vice President was still in Malawi to attend trial was for him to be physcally reporting to ACB.
Khunga dismissed the defence’s argument that the Vice President is already guarded by the Malawi Police Service that would report him if something sinister happened insisting “we do not trust the Malawi Police Service as ACB.”
When requested by lawyer Kalekeni Kaphale to withdraw the remarks, Khunga insisted that indeed ACB does not trust the Malawi Police Service.
In his bail ruling on Tuesday, Judge Kapindu described the remarks and insistence as strange and that he refused to join the bureau in their mistrust of the Malawi Police Service.
