Pika claims ‘Mphwiyo paid for his shooting’
Pika Manondo, the second accused person in the shooting of former Ministry of Finance budget director Paul Mphwiyo, yesterday told the court that if his co-accused is the alleged shooter then the victim paid for his own shooting.
Evidence has been submitted before the High Court in Lilongwe that Dauka Manondo, Pika’s brother, made a K300 000 ($433) deposit to Macdonald Kumwembe whom Mphwiyo identified as his shooter on the night of September 13 2013 outside the gate of his Area 43 residence in Lilongwe.
Pika Manondo is charged in the shooting alongside private practice lawyer Ralph Kasambara and Kumwembe, a former Malawi Defence Force (MDF) soldier.
Dauka was acquitted on the charge of conspiracy to commit murder while his brother is answering charges of attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder.
During cross-examination by Kasambara, Manondo told the court that he got the K300 000 from Mphwiyo to give to Kumwembe for a “party matter” but he gave it to his brother to make the deposit.
Ironically, when his brother, who Mphwiyo said he has known for a long time, went to deposit the money, he falsified the name of the depositor and telephone number.
But while denying knowledge of a theory that the K300 000 was a deposit from Dauka to Kumwembe as payment for the shooting, PikaManondo confirmed that the money came from Mphwiyo.
He said: “The money came from the victim. If it came from him, then Mr Mphwiyo paid his friend Kumwembe to go shoot him.”
Kasambara distanced himself from the transaction and the charge he is facing of conspiracy to commit murder.
In response to Kasambara’s question on his involvement in the transaction, PikaManondo responded: “My lord, the third accused was not involved in that transaction.”
Cross-examination continued yesterday afternoon with Kasambara taking PikaManondo back to the testimony by his bodyguard, Mphwiyo and Cashgate convict Osward Lutepo who told the court that a senior police officer in 2013 coerced him to implicate Kasambara in Cashgate.
Mphwiyo’s shooting is widely believed to have exposed Cashgate, the systematic plunder of public funds at Capital Hill by some civil servants who connived with some players in the private sector to defraud government through dubious claims for payment for goods and services not rendered or inflated invoices.
