MEC officer handed 2 years jail over stolen hard drive
The Blantyre Magistrates Court has sentenced to two years imprisonment with hard labour (IHL) Malawi Electoral Commission (Mec) Data Entry Clerk, Hanleck Mbwetule for stealing external hard disk.
Mbwetule was convicted on Tuesday for stealing an external hard disk from Commission’s ICT Department when he appeared before Magistrate Bodole to answer charge of theft by public servant.
He pleaded guilty to the offence and the court has since sentenced him to two years jail term.
In passing sentence on Thursday, Magistrate Bodole said the offence committed by Mbwetule attracted a mandatory minimum sentence of two years and a maximum of life in jail.
She said, therefore, a custodial sentence was proper for the convict.
(MEC) on Monday dismissed the hard drive contained voters roll.
Chief Elections Officer Willie Kalonga said the hard disk was stolen on Saturday and police apprehended Mbwetula.
“The external hard disk was used within the ICT Department for transferring documents from one computer to another and not storage of the voter’s roll,” said Kalonga.
The Chief Elections Officer said the voters roll for May 20 elections containing information about 7.5 million registered voters is “safe and intact.”
He said information of voters roll cannot fit in the external hard disk of 500GB.
