Court unlocks Bingu accounts

The High Court in Blantyre on Thursday unblocked late president Bingu wa Mutharika’s bank accounts which government froze over unpaid K5 billion estate duty.

The court made the order to free the bank accounts after the Estate Commissioner and the Mutharika family, through their lawyers, entered into a consent order that includes a commitment by the Mutharikas to pay the estate duty.

The court order, signed by Judge Dunstan Mwaungulu, essentially means that the Mutharika family can now have access to the estate estimated at K61 billion, in both property and cash, according to a government-hired valuer Yeremia Chihana.

The order, also signed by lawyers Lusungu Gondwe for the Estate Commissioners and Kalekeni Kaphale for the Mutharika family, also means that matters relating to the estate duty are being resolved out of court.

The consent order by the two parties removed an injunction which the Estate Commissioners obtained from the High Court in Zomba on June 21, freezing all but one of Mutharika bank accounts.

The order mandates the interim administrators of the late Mutharika estate, Kaphale and lawyer James Tomoka, for Mutharika’s widow Callista, to apply for letters of administration of the estate at the High Court within 30 days from Thursday.

By this undertaking to obtain letters of administration, the Mutharika family committed to pay all proper and lawful outgoings, including all debts and liabilities requiring discharge on behalf of the estate.

While maintaining the valuer appointed by the Estate Commissioners, YMW Property Investment Limited, the order required the interim administrators to appoint professional valuers to determine the values for estate duty purposes of assets requiring such expert valuation.

Reads the consent order: “That YMW Property Investment Limited shall be the appointed professional valuer of the Estate Duty Commissioners and payment for the services of YMW Property Investment Ltd shall be the responsibility of the Estate Duty Commissioners in accordance with section 22(2) of the Estate Duty Act.

“In the event that the parties hereto cannot agree on a valuation, the parties shall appoint the President of the Malawi Law Society to nominate a valuer from a list submitted by the parties whose valuation shall be final. The parties hereto shall be responsible in equal terms for the cost of services of such valuer.”

All disputes relating to the composition of the estate would be referred to the High Court, according to the order.

Kaphale and Tomoka, according to the order, undertook to determine a provisional value of the estate of administration and pay estate duty based on such provisional valuation within 30 days of the grant of Letters of Administration, save that if circumstances do not permit to do so, reasons must be reported to the commissioners.

Further undertakings by Kaphale and Tomoka read: “To submit to the commissioners monthly reports regarding the calling in and outgoings due for payment and make such further payments towards Estate Duty as shall be appropriate; and to finally and as expeditiously as possible pay from the assets of the Estate all the Estate Duty that shall be lawfully payable in respect of the Estate.”

In an interview yesterday, Kaphale said he and Tomoka would apply for the letters of administration at the High Court in Blantyre on Monday or Tuesday.

The Mutharikas, through their lawyers, have been disputing the K5 billion estate duty and the K61 billion estate estimation by Chihana.

Some critics have pressed for an explanation on how the former leader amassed such wealth within eight years of serving as president.

Mutharika died of cardiac arrest while in office on April 5 2012.