Chilima Back in Court, Crucial Ruling Ahead

On the political landscape, Malawi’s New Year starts today when the High Court in Lilongwe delivers a ruling on preliminary issues that have been raised in the case in which Vice President Saulos Chilima is accused of demanding unspecified sum of money from business man Zuneth Sattar to influence government contracts.

By any means, the ruling today will have significant impact on Chilima’s political next move. It is also a ruling that will also affect the current political landscape. Every political player is anxious to see what happens today. The country’s political new year starts today.

1. The Issues

At the heart of the expected ruling is a fight between the State and the Defense on the submission of more disclosures. These disclosures include MDF council minutes that allegedly approved the same contract that Chilima is accused of influencing and the correspondence between President Lazarus Chakwera and MDF in relation to Satter.

MDF insists that come hell or high water, they won’t release the documents to protect national security. On ther hand, the defence argues that the State can’t eat its cake and still have it. The state, they argued, they must choose to protect national security and discharge Chilima or do the opposite – release all the documents and trial commences.

2. The Expected Ruling

Largely, the ruling will settle this argument either in State’s favour to have them keep the documents but trial continues or they keep the documents and trial falls off and Chilima is discharged.

Largely, it is this issue that is under the spotlight this morning from 10 am.

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