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| National |
| Tembo speaks on bishops case |
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by
Aubrey Mchulu, 31 October 2003
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13:51:02
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MCP President warned on Monday that President Bakili Muluzi’s attempt to resurrect the case where he is accused of plotting to kill Catholic Bishops following their 1992 pastoral letter will only embarrass the government.
Tembo described what became to be known as the Bishops’ case as “a very embarrassing case”, saying Muluzi’s recent reference to the issue “clearly shows there is something wrong with our head of state”.
He was reacting to Muluzi’s threats at a rally in Salima last Saturday that the police could arrest Tembo anytime to answer charges of plotting to kill the bishops following the pastoral letter which was critical of the MCP regime.
Muluzi also played an audio tape at the rally which, he claimed, recorded proceedings of the meeting where Tembo and other MCP leaders plotted to kill the bishops.
Said Tembo: “Which tape did he play? Is it an MBC tape? Does he know what happened in court for the case to collapse?”
Before the case was withdrawn by the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Fahad Assani in November 2000, the audio tapes in question were thrown out from being part of the evidence because their source could not be authenticated.
When contacted on Thursday, Tembo’s lawyer Gustave Kaliwo confirmed that the case “collapsed” in court in Zomba and was withdrawn but refused to comment further.
“There is a record about the case and why it was closed but I don’t want to go further than this,” said Kaliwo.
But another lawyer who opted for anonymity said the case was withdrawn when Tembo and Muluzi were political bed-fellows against former MCP president Gwanda Chakuamba and that Muluzi now wants to revive the case because they have gone separate ways.
“Muluzi and Tembo are politicians and they know whatever arrangement they had at that time and it smacks of hypocrisy on the part of Muluzi to try to have the case back now that his relationship with Tembo has sort of soured,” observed the lawyer.
Malawi Law Society (MLS) spokesman Charles Mhango said in a separate interview on Monday that going by Muluzi’s statement at the rally, prosecution of Tembo and company would defeat its purpose.
“The purpose of prosecution is to establish the truth but in this case, if the case resurrects, it will not be prosecution but persecution. It will also be a sheer waste of public resources,” Mhango said, noting that the case can only come up if there is new evidence which was not available when the action was struck out.
In another interview on Thursday, Mhango said the legal position is that the DPP is in charge of all criminal matters and his office is supposed to be independent of any control or interference from any quarters including the executive branch.
He said the DPP has powers to institute or withdraw any proceedings without giving any reasons as long as the DPP determines in his view that the matter is worth withdrawing.
“Nobody can question the DPP’s decisions but it is in the interest of transparency and accountability that he gives reasons so that he is not seen as if he is abusing his powers,” said Mhango.
Apparently angered by MCP’s recent decision to suspend Lilongwe Southeast MP Hetherwick Ntaba as publicity secretary, a medical doctor by profession, for accompanying Muluzi’s mother to a South African hospital, Muluzi castigated MCP leaders, describing them as murderers who do not deserve to regain power in next year’s general elections.
In closing the case in November 2000, the DPP said he did not see how the country would benefit by prosecuting Tembo and his colleagues—former MCP administrative secretary the late Wadson Deleza, former Blantyre district chair the late Charles Kamphulusa, MCP central executive member Elia Katola Phiri and Central Region women’s league chair Hilda Manjamkhosi—saying doing so would only bring confusion.
“I have carefully gone through the case and I have seen that the country will not benefit either way by prosecuting these people,” said Assani, who this week said he did not wish to make a fresh comment on the matter because he already made his decision known when he withdrew the case.
Reacting to Muluzi’s threat to revive the case, Father Robert Mwaungulu, spokesman for the Episcopal Conference of Malawi (ECM), a forum for all Catholic Bishops in the country, this week described the alleged plot as “a by-gone plot” and urged all political parties not to use the church to gain political mileage.
Mwaungulu said weak points of some political parties must not be exaggerated “as all politicians have their strong and weak points” adding that instead people must dwell on issues that will contribute to the betterment of the nation.
“Mistakes were made. The then MCP took a wrong approach to deal with the pastoral letter. But that issue is gone. As a church, we stand for peaceful co-existence and we, therefore, urge all political players to work for the good of the nation.
“We do not want to be used wrongly by any political party for individual political gain,” he said.
The pastoral letter entitled Living Our Faith, which was a direct challenge to the iron-fist rule of Kamuzu Banda, is widely believed to have jolted Malawians from slumber and put them on a collision course with the then one-party system of government.
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