Ex-Macra boss Itaye arrested over fraud

Malawi Police Service, Fiscal and Fraud Section, on Tuesday in Blantyre  arrested former director general of Malawi Communications Regulatory Authority (Macra), Godfrey Itaye over  fraud activities suspected to have occurred during the previous regime.

Itaye, who is currently chief executive officer for Lilongwe Water Board  and based in the capital city, drove to Blantyre himself after being summoned by the Fiscal cops.

He was under arrested when he surrendered himself.

Police sources said they are interested to question him on the their investigations.

Nyasa Times has been consistently reporting that Itaye  was at the center of top level corruption including awarding dubious contracts to his own parents in laws and is also alleged to have pocketed $150 thousand dollars bribe from Agilis International, a firm contracted to upgrade the controversial CIRMS well known as ‘ spy’ machine.

The allegations  include the withdraw of K10 million, between January and June 2020, without supporting documents, that is purported to have been shared among the regulator’s managers.

The Human Rights Defenders Coalition (HRDC)  also questions a K750 million ($1 million) payment to a firm known as AGLIS. The machine allegedly did not need any upgrade.

“It is alleged that the machine is working properly and did not need any upgrade. However, management and AGLIS are suspected to have conspired so that AGLIS would indicate that there was need for an upgrade and were then paid $1 million.

“Subsequently, no upgrade was done and Macra was not repaid the money. It is alleged that the money was shared between some Macra staff members and AGLIS,” reads the HRDC letter in part.

On Friday , police also arrested Macra’s director of Finance Ben Chitsonga and Procurement specialist Joseph Ngalawa for allegedly buying former ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) cloth worth K100 million.

DPP used Macra as its main cash-cow institution.