SPC Zamba denies involvement in passport saga
Secretary to the President and Cabinet (SPC) Colleen Zamba has described as false reports suggesting that she is involved in the tampering of the system at the Department of Immigration and Citizenship Services.
The tampering of the system has rendered the department helpless, as it cannot print passports for thousands of the applicants of the travel documents.
When he delivered the State of the Nation Address (SONA) two weeks ago, President Dr. Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera confirmed that the system had been hacked.
Chakwera also revealed that the ‘hackers’ were demanding huge sums of money in ransom, but he vowed that his government would not release any money to the tricksters.
On Tuesday, one of the online publications in Malawi reported that Zamba, Anthony Bendulo (former OPC Digital Lead) and the department’s Director General Charles Kalumo were behind the network glitches at the passport printing entity.
The publication claimed that a payment of MK1 billion is being processed for them to restore the system.
But Zamba refuted the allegations, wondering why she would want to frustrate government business, which she is the head.
“It’s all lies. Just ignore it. It’s false and a propaganda aimed to tarnish my image,” she said in an interview on Wednesday.
The SPC has since implored journalists to exercise professionalism when discharging their duties.
