Justice Tembo testifies in judges bribery case: Implicates Mutharika’s lawyer Mbeta, DPP spokesman Brown Mpinganjira

Of one of the witnesses in the alleged bribery case against business mogul Thomson Mpinganjira., High Court Judge Mike Tembo has detailed the involvement of former president Peter Mutharika’s lead lawyer Frank Mbeta and  Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) spokesperson Brown Mpinganjira in the bribery case.

Tembo, who was among  five judges who presided over the presidential election case at the High Court which sat as the Constitutional Court,  told the High Court on Friday in Blantyre that he communicated with Mpinganjira when he wanted to find out from him if the money given to the judges, through lawyer Frank Mbeta, was delivered.

The judge said he told Mpinganjira that they never received the said money from Mbeta and the other person and advised him that he was just being duped.

He added that Mpinganjira told him that he had been sending money to the judges which, at the point of their communication, was in excess of K100 million.

“Mpinganjira asked me for advice on how he can continue so that the money reaches the judges but I said I will think about it,” he said.

He further told the court that the money was coming from the DPP.

In his testimony, Tembo says he believes that apart from lawyer Mbeta, the other person who was getting money from the defendant to give to the judges was politician Brown Mpinganjira.- a relation to the business mogul

He says he believes so because the second conversation he had with the defendant shows that Brown Mpinganjira was the one who was supposed to take the money to one of the judges for the judges to share.

Currently, the court presided over by Justice Dorothy DeGabrielle has been furnished with WhatsApp text messages between Judge Tembo and Thom Mpinganjira which the State has brought to support its evidence.

Tembo has since said that he had not received any money from Mpinganjira to influence his decisions in the case.

Mpinganjira is accused of allegedly offering a bribe to judges who presided over the historic election case.

Among others, Mpinganjira is charged with offering advantage to a public officer contrary to Section 94 (2) of the Corrupt Practices Act and attempting to induce Justices Tembo and Potani to exercise their function corruptly.

Mpinganjira made an application for plea bargain—an arrangement where prosecution and defence discuss a mutually satisfactory way to dispose a case.