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| National |
| Court blocks VP's trip to UK |
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by
Rabecca Theu, 10 January 2007
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06:30:27
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The High Court in the commercial city of Blantyre on Tuesday reversed its earlier permission for Vice-President Cassim Chilumpha to travel to the United Kingdom for medical attention.
Making the ruling in the case in which Chilumpha was challenging government for blocking his trip abroad, Judge Mclean Kamwambe said the court was not satisfied with the reasons the vice president, who is on bail on treason charges, gave to travel outside.
“The state has convinced the court that it would not be in the interest of justice to let the applicant travel abroad...The court’s order permitting the applicant to travel abroad is hereby set aside or revoked,” said Kamwambe.
Reading the 30-page ruling which took about an hour, Kamwambe said the applicant failed to justify why his ailments could not be treated in South Africa.
“[The medical report] only shows that [Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital’s director Dr. Ibrahim Idana] examined the applicant and prescribed medication. There is no proof of history of the applicant’s illness which could justify that treatment in Malawi has failed and that there is urgent need of treatment abroad. There is also no evidence of deteriorating condition of the applicant’s health.
“There is no record of admission [of the applicant] to any local hospital, no evidence of the prescriptions he was given at any other time or the pharmacy from which he obtained any medicine.
“Dr. Idana is not a specialist and he cannot, on his own, make final recommendations of the applicant going abroad,” said the judge, adding that the state was ready to commence trial on the treason case.
Kamwambe pointed out that the court was not justified to give permission to the applicant despite the varied bail conditions, which stated that he would be required to seek permission from a High Court judge unlike the earlier condition that required him to seek permission from the President.
“The court was not justified to grant him permission. The requirement on [the changed bail conditions] was not complied to because the applicant did not give the specific date of return,” said Kamwambe on the permission granted by Justice Healey Potani.
Kamwambe further said the evasive conduct in which Chilumpha handled fresh interrogations by the state in the treason case was “questionable, suspicious and lacking in good faith” because he kept changing reasons on why he could not attend to the interrogations in good time and that it was around the same time that he obtained the permission to travel abroad for medical treatment.
Chilumpha’s lawyer, Innocent Kalua, said he would not immediately say what his client would do after the ruling.
“I have to consult. I can’t make a decision immediately,” he said.
The state was represented by lawyer Mphatso Kachule.
Chilumpha obtained an order from the court early December to travel abroad to seek medical attention on several ailments but was stopped by government which obtained an injunction stopping him from travelling.
Idana issued a medical report in regard to the VP’s health and recommended that he gets medical attention in the UK.
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