HRDC, DPP  tell Chakwera no sacred cows over Covidgate: ‘Use law to deal with Covid funds abusers’

Rights activists are calling on President Lazarus Chakwera to use the law to deal with the perpetrators of  K6.2 billion Covid-19 response funds from Treasury amid a public outcry.

The Human Rights Defenders Coalition (HRDC) has since asked Chakwera not to shield culprits in the abuse of K6.2 billion Covid-19 funds.

HRDC has made the call after President Chakwera’s call to auditing institutions to expedite the process of making the audit report public.

According to the statement signed by the HRDC chairperson Gift Trapence and the coalition’s leadership, all individuals involved in the abuse of the funds must face the law regardless as expected.

HRDC has also called upon responsible auditing institutions to release the audit report without further delays.

“HRDC’s expectation is that controlling officers should not undermine this Presidential directive as this is tantamount to insubordination,”reads part of the statement.

The funds, which Treasury released in August last year for the Covid-19 fight, have been plundered by some public officers.

Former governing Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) spokesperson on finance Joseph Mwanamvekha said the opposition party wants the National Audit Office report be submitted to Parliament through the Public Accounts Committee.

“If it is found that these funds have been stolen or misappropriated, the responsible officers must immediately be arrested and prosecuted under the laws of the country.,” he said.

Mwanamvekha, who was minister of Finance until the court-sanction June 23 2020 Fresh Presidential Election, claimed that Department of Disaster Management Affairs (Dodma) in the President’s office only accounted for K595 million when the Presidential Task Force on Covid-19 demanded an expenditure report on the K6.2 billion.

He alleged that out of the K595 million, K15 million could not be accounted for and Dodma was sent back to return on February 9 with the full expenditure report.

Mwanamvekha said without being overly speculative, the conduct of Dodma could just be ‘a microcosm of a much larger rot happening in government’ regarding the use of funds meant for the fight against Covid-19.