Matemba says will leave ACB at end of contract this year
The Director General of the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB), Reyneck Matemba, says he will be leaving the bureau as he has decided not to renew his contract when it ends this year.
ACB director general Matemba and deputy director Eliah Bodole are now addressing the press.
Matemba emotionally told journalists on Tuesday at a news conference in Lilongwe that his decisions are not influenced by politicians.
His comments comes after a barrage of grilling from journalists over the public perception of corruption and of ACB as a biased institution working under the influence of politically connected individuals.
“I have read in social media platforms that I cannot bite a finger which bites me. Which finger. I am here on secondment. I have a full time job with the ministry of Justice where I worked as the registrar general before I came here,” he said.
Matemba said he has expressed desire to leave the bureau previously.
The conspicuously charged Matemba, a lawyer and career civil servant, told journalists that he was not appointed by President Peter Mutharika to the ACB but by former president Joyce Banda as deputy director before President Mutharika elevated him as boss and confirmed by the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) dominated Public Appointments of Parliament.
Mutharika appointed Matemba, then deputy director, as the graft-busting body’s director general, October 2017 following his former boss Lucas Kondowe’s decision not to renew his contract which expired the same month.
Matemba has since come under intense fire from some quarters of the society who say the ACB is quick to arrest members of the opposition on corruption charges leaving out the big fish in government.
He challenged the media to name a single opposition who had been arrested by the ACB during o reign.
Matemba, who in 2017 recused himself as lead lawyer in the K1.7 billion corruption case of former president Bakili Muluzi, instead gave out examples of five ruling party elites some of whom are former minister of Agriculture George Chaponda and the former presidential aide Uladi Mussa.
However, Mussa’s arrest an prosecution started when he was vice president of People’s Party (PP) while in opposition before ‘changing goal posts’ to be in the ruling camp.
Matemba said the ACB is appealing against a lower case decision to dismiss the corruption case of Chaponda.
After the two hour marathon of questioning and answering, the journalists seemed not to have been convinced with the reasons why Matemba refused to name the suspects.
Matemba said the media practitioners should consult their respective lawyers on legal opinion why the ACB has refused to name the suspects in public.
The ACB boss said he knows he will be insulted and ridiculed for keeping the names secret, but defended his move, saying he is doing so for legal reasons.
Several independent surveys, including those by Transparency International, Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (Osisa) found that perceptions of the people are that corruption is on the rise and that the institution mostly targeted those not affiliated to political parties in power.
Matemba conceded that the bureau lost trust from the public and that this is the time for the bureau to gain the lost public trust.
Before his appointment as ACB director general, Matemba worked at Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs where he served as assistant chief legislative counsel, Administrator General and in the Legal Aid Department now called Legal Aid Bureau.
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Good riddance, what has Mr Matemba achieved at ACB after all. The only reason he was appointed as director general of ACB was just to appear to fight corruption and not to fight corruption and he has fulfilled his mandate.
He recused himself from the Muluzi case when he was deputy director and since then the Muluzi case has gone nowhere………..although Mr Muluzi is fit and well, msana wuja umavutavuta wuja nthawi yamilandu pano unasiyilatu, azimayi kumangosintha every night.
Matemba should go and no one will mourn him, we want Martha Chizuma to take over.
Cowadice for thousands of year but a soldier dies by once. Boasting & boosting about your ability & credibiliy at ACB for what? After ACB came into existence where were you? Somebody else will take over far more superior than you. You’re corrupt yourself. We can’t at all remember your legacy at ACB Matemba just await your contract expirly date….beat it!
I don’t think anybody cares about what your plans are after your contract is over!!!……….. we are talking about the here and now, what are you doing about this bombshell??????
Mr matemba, next time do your investigations, arrest the culprits, charge them with a crime ( Crimes). Lock them up …..then have a press conference while you are well prepared. Do NOT have a press briefing to talk about you and you have nothing to offer to the Malawian people, that tarnishes your credibility.
We assume the tape-recorded information Mr. Matemba got from CJ is: Individual X approached Judge Y with suggestion Z. I fail to see where a case of defamation will arise (unless the tape-recording is fake, is it?). The decision not to put out this information is from clue-less Mutharika who would have been the beneficiary had this gone to plan. For a professional to be used in this manner speaks volumes about how unethical our professionals have become!!!! MLS should pressure Mr. Matemba to put out this information to the citizenry!!!
Mr Matemba. Just pack and go. The nation will not miss you not even a second. ACB shall always be there, someone will take it from you. Don’t waste our money telling us about Chanco bla bla. The University was built before you were born which means we have thousands of lawyers from that university, so don’t boast. You have failed miserably. GO NOW BWANA. Wherever they want useless people , you will be welcomed. Want an ACB Director who will fight corruption regardless of who has done it. We want an ACB Director who will use his/her education to… Read more »
SURELY, MARTHA CHAZUMA, THE CURRENT OMBUDSMAN , CAN DO A GOOD JOB AT ACB DIRECTOR GENERAL.
MARTHA HAS SO FAR PROVED TO BE NOT ONLY PROFESSIONAL BUT ALSO FEARLESS AND COURAGEOUS.
MATEMBA IS A COWARD, HE WAS ONLY EFFECTIVE AS DEPUTY DIRECTOR GENERAL OF ACB NOT AS DG.MATEMBA MUST GO ON LEAVE PENDING HIS CONTRACT EXPIRY , HE IS A LIABILITY AT ACB.
Unless you perform extraordinarily well in the current year, including the Bribing Case, you will not be missed at all since there is nothing really. that will add value to your legacy at ACB. You may as well go wherever it is, after ACB, to continue receiving fat cheques for doing nothing just like so many top civil servants are doing.
He is in the wrong job and seems to have a spongy chin. Lead and do the job you were employed to do. What’s the point of being a crime buster and you seem to ride in the wheels of gangsters. Man! Give other convincing reasons
So the administrator General is ready to take back madeya like you?