ACB moves to speed up corruption cases

The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) has proposed introduction of an administrative arrangement within the Judiciary which would quickly dispose of all financial crimes-related cases.

The arrangement would see a judge or a magistrate being appointed from time to time to quickly handle financial crimes of above K1 billion or those involving politically-exposed persons.

ACB director general Martha Chizuma said this yesterday in Mzuzu in an interview on the sidelines of the International Anti-Corruption Day (IAD) commemoration.

She said such an arrangement would see cases being disposed of quickly unlike in the arrangement where some corruption cases take over five years to be concluded.

Chizuma said the proposed Financial Crimes Court, which the Judiciary is working on, will take almost a year to come into fruition because it will involve law review and amendments.

She said: “There has been a discussion on the Financial Crimes Court and the Judiciary has been working on that for some time, but that needs law review, amendments to the law, it’s a process. If we are to be fair to that process, from today, it would take another year to materialise.

“There is urgency to this corruption fight and we have proposed an arrangement where if it’s a case dealing financial crime of K1 billion and above, instead of having the case go through the normal system which takes long, there should be a system that appoints a judge or a magistrate to stop all the other case and concentrate on this one.”

Without necessarily mentioning how many cases have been concluded in the country this year, Chizuma said the bureau has 1 000 cases under investigation, which will be ready in January 2022 and will require the courts.

She said the bureau has this year concluded three major investigations of the Malawi Rural Electrification Project (Marep 9), Marka-Bangula Railway Project and National Oil Company of Malawi (Nocma).

The ACB director said the main cases concluded this year in the court include that of business magnate Thom Mpinganjira, where he attempted to bribe judges of the High Court in the presidential elections case and was slapped with a nine-year jail term.

In an interview yesterday, High Court and Supreme Court of Appeal registrar Gladys Gondwe said she was yet to get a briefing from two judges who represented the Judiciary at the National Anti-Corruption Dialogue Meeting, where Chizuma made the proposal.

But Gondwe said the proposal may have come in as a result of delays by the Task Force on Special Crimes Court to meet due to financial constraints.

She said: “The ACB convened that meeting and wanted to hear progress on the Financial Crimes Court. I am yet to get a briefing from the two judges, who represented the Judiciary, who are also part of the task force. So, I am yet to appreciate what came out of there. I will have to check with the judges on policy direction.

“There isn’t much movement on the Financial Crimes Court, I must say. The task force was not able to meet because we were not able to access funding due to challenges with Ifmis [Integrated Finance Management System]. However, they are scheduled to meet on December 23. Meanwhile, we have asked for resources from Treasury and we are hopeful that they will provide.”

Gondwe said Chizuma may have come up with the new proposal after looking at feedback from the Judiciary on the progress made regarding the Financial Crimes Court.

In an earlier interview, veteran prosecutor Kamudoni Nyasulu, while welcoming the proposal, called for an analysis of why the current court set up has not been adequate to handle financial crimes and other criminal cases.

He said: “Any decision at national level must be based on evidence. You get a lot of claims about adjournments, but has anyone looked at the matter critically to see what the problem is? What is required is critical case management. How much court space is being utilised per day, how much judge time is being utilised per day?

“When Cashgate [the looting of public funds in 2013] started, all cases were given enough judges.

Not that you don’t need a special court, but at the moment, with the current judges, has it been shown that they cannot handle the workload? How many cases have been taken to court but are failing to finish because the judges are busy?”

While the exact amount required to implement the courts is still being worked out, the High Court and Malawi Supreme Court of Appeal annually costs the taxpayer K3.6 billion and K10.7 billion, respectively, while the Commercial Division costs K596 million.

Special courts come in a variety of forms such as special branches or divisions of existing courts, others are established as separate, standalone units within the judicial hierarchy.

A new court would require new office space, judges, support staff, furniture, vehicles and other administrative and logistical requirements. The proposal will also require amendments to the law requiring both time and funding, according to experts.

The International Anti-Corruption Day is being commemorated under the theme ‘Integrity: Key To A Corrupt-free Malawi’.

Meanwhile, in a statement, the British High Commission in Lilongwe has said Malawi since last year has made substantial strides in the fight against corruption, with increased coordination and a whole-of-government approach.

Such strides include increasing funding to strategic law enforcement agencies in recent budgets, allowing agencies to hire staff and pursue complex investigations, but also high level arrests and pausing of suspicious contract awards.

To build on this progress, the UK has encouraged the government to continue in its efforts to fully establish and resource the Asset Forfeiture Unit within the Director of Public Prosecutions Office.

“We urge the Government to fill principal-level vacancies within the Financial Intelligence Authority and Auditor General’s Office.

We eagerly await Government’s plans in prioritising key findings from the Public Sector Systems Review Taskforce report, to ensure that strong controls are in place in public institutions and that civil servants are held to account,” the statement reads in part. On the other hand, the US Department of State has announced Chizuma as one of the 12 New Anti-Corruption Champions.