Mphwiyo raps DPP Kachale as ‘an agent of injustice’: Calls for Malawi Law Society to discipline top prosecutor for misconduct

Former budget director Paul Mphwiyo has accused the Director of Public Prosecutions Mary Kachale of being “an agent of injustice’, calling for investigations on the conduct of the top prosecutor by the Malawi Law Society.

Mphwiyo, who has told the High Court that State prosecutors pressured him to sign affidavits implicating convicts of attempted murder on his life in 2013 including former justice minister Ralph Kasambara, accuses the State of falsifying events surrounding his alleged interference with witnesses and says his own experience with the State prosecutors suggests they pressure witnesses.

He was testifying in defence of his bail revocation case which the State has applied to the court.

The matter which was being held in the Judge’s Chambers of the presiding judge Esmie Chombo.

Mphwiyo stunned the court when he narrated how the state top prosecutor used him and others to ensure that she wins the case against Kasambara and others in the Republic vs. MacDonald Kumwembe and two others using crooked ways.

Kasambara  was sentenced to 13 years in prison while  co-accused Macdonald Kumwembe and Pika Manondo were given 15 years sentences each last year after the High Court in Lilongwe found them guilty of plotting and carrying out an attempt to murder Mphwiyo.

For example, Mphwiyo is reportedly having told the court that Kachale and prosecutor Enock Chibwana of pressuring him to sign affidavits the State had offered.

He told the court that all this started when thieves broke into her mother’s house in Blantyre and days later a house to his brother-in-marriage was also attacked by unknown thieves and when he reported the matter to the authorities at that time , the two came to him saying they have find out that it was Kumwembe and Manondo who were behind it to intimidate the gun shot survivor from testifying against them and brought already written affidavits  to sign affidavits which were false and was against his will to form basis of bail revocation application for the three.

Mphwiyo said he refused to sign them as there was no evidence that indeed the two incidents were done or connected by the two.

He claims that State prosecutors are getting to him for his refusal to cooperate in making false statement.

“Madam DPP is using the same unprofessional tactics in my present case in trying to revoke my bail and coerce witnesses into falsely testifying against me. That’s the reason the State signed an agreement with Kalonga to falsely testify against me in exchange of benefits for his sentence and dropping of all of his other charges that would have perennially seen him in jail for a very long period of time.

“This pattern is repeating itself because they tried to coerce me to swear a false affidavit to have the bails of Kumwembe and others revoked. I refused to do so but these events speak of a prosecution facade that coerces witnesses to falsely testify against individuals that they target for whatever reason,” reads some of notes that were taken from Mphwiyo’s testimony against his bail revocation application

Mphwiyo is  also reportedly have explained to the court  how Kachale and Chibwana coerced habitual convict Charles Chalunda who was serving 18 years armed robbery sentence placed on him by High Court judge Edward Twea to come and testify against Kasambara in the case of his life attempted murder .

He told the court that the state used him while knowing that he was a convict serving his jail term but they released him and lied in court that he was first offender on perjury case not robbery.

According to court records, the sentence by Justice Twea was meted out on February 28, 2008. The sentence was backdated to run from 25 May 2007 when he was first arrested.

Chalunda was jailed alongside his accomplices Joseph Nathaniel, Saidi Imphani and Bushiri Bunaya Banda  and his  sentence was supposed to run up to 24 May 2019. He was supposed to serve two thirds of his sentence (12 years).

He was also previously convicted for being found with a prohibited weapon and sentenced to 30 months imprisonment.

Mphwiyo told the court that in 2015 the DPP’s clerk Mr Mdeza knowingly and wilfully on behalf of the DPP misled the Zomba magistrate court that Chalunda was a first offender when they tried him for perjury. This is the perjury that came about when he had changed from implicating Cashgate kingpin Oswald Lutepo in Mphwiyo shooting case through a sworn affidavit implicating Kumwembe and Manondo.

“How can a whole DPP not have evidence about the release of a convicted person like Chalunda from prison and coerce him to falsely testify against other people? This is professional misconduct and the Law Society and/or the Attorney General need to discipline the DPP,” reads some notes from the hearing held in chamber .

Mphwiyo is reportedly to have told the court that it is due to this kind of unprofessional prosecution leads to miscarriage of justice.

He also told the court that the other witness that the DPP intended to use for bail revocation was Robert Difuleya who after meeting the DPP Kachale and Chibwana in Blantyre went to his lawyer to lodge a complaint against State coercion to bear false testimony in the bail revocation and his lawyers wrote a letter warning of the conduct of the two and that letters are available on court records.

According to Mphwiyo, Difuleya was later allegedly killed by the police.  This claim is based on a court case that the family sued the State following his death while in the hands of the police.

Mphwiyo is accused of reaching out to State witnesses including Daniel Jenya, an economist at the Ministry of Finance. But Mphwiyo accuses the State of falsifying events.

“…as a State witness myself in the case of the Republic vs. Macdonald Kumwembe and others, I have had first-hand experience how the State specifically Mrs Mary Kachale (Director of Public Prosecutions)  and Mr Enock Chibwana constantly kept on pressuring me to swear affidavits  that I had been contacted,” reads part of the affidavit.

Mphwiyo further argues in the affidavit that one of the State witnesses whose affidavit is currently paraded as evidence of him interfering with Jenya, Oyster Semawati Chisale, a police officer, reportedly confided in him that the DPP was seeking grounds to revoke his bail way before the current court application.

However, the affidavit in court by Chisale indicates that he had met Mphwiyo to warn him against alleged interference with State witnesses.

The matter has since been adjourned to a later date in August when the presiding judge Esmie Chombo is expected to deliver her ruling where to revoke the bail or not.

She has since give both the state and defence three weeks period to submit their final submissions by 1st August before she deliver her ruling

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