Second Republican president, Frederick Chiluba and his co-accused have started their defence in the Lusaka Magistrates Court.
Dr. Chiluba and former Access Financial Services Directors, Faustin Kabwe and Aaron chungu opened their defence – Monday.
Mr. Kabwe was the first to take the stand.
The three were found with a case to answer on 12 counts of theft.
Dr. Chiluba, Mr. Kabwe and Mr. Chungu were charged with theft after they allegedly stole public funds from the Zambia Intelligence Account known as ZAMTROP.
The former President is facing six counts of theft by public servant while Kabwe and Chungu are also facing six counts of theft.
During examination by defence lawyer John Sangwa, Mr. Kabwe 58, told the court how he excelled in his accountancy profession in the late 1970, a situation he said enabled him serve in different organisations.
He said upon completion of his secondary education,he was recruited by Indeco estates as a trainee accountant and later proceeded to the united kingdom after Indeco offered him sponsorship to further his education.
Mr. Kabwe told the court that he worked for various organisations was admitted to be member of the association of certified chartered accountants.
And Dr. Chiluba’s Lawyers have complained to the court about Task Force Chairman, Max Nkole’s remarks on Radio phoenix and published in the post newspaper of saturday May 10.
The complaint has been tabled before Lusaka High Court deputy registra Jones Chinyama who is handling the case.
Mr. Nkole is alleged to have said that Dr. Chiluba and his co-acussed can have their case dropped if they returned what they stole.
The Lawyers complained that the statement by Mr. Nkole is contempt to the court as it presumed Dr. Chiluba and his co-accused guilty .
The Lawyers also said the statement was disrespectful to the corruption proceedings in court since the law presumed the accused person innocent until a competent court found them guilty.
The lawyers have since requested that Mr. Nkole be summoned before court and show cause why he should not be committed to court.
Ruling in the matter is expected to be delivered – Tuesday
Nice that thieves have started there defence will see how they will defend themselves. Just bring 75% will whole heartedly forgive you than waste our time in courts. hassles.
#1, I do not subscribe with thieves. But, let the courts do the job. Be educated that it is not Chiluba who has disappointed the pipo in his court process but the grz. He is not guilty until proved to be so. I personally was very happy when Levy was appointed as president. I thought he was going to deal with “alleged” thieves in a very proficient and efficient manner. But, alas, the whole thing has been a circus. They are just making money out of it. And the whole now does not make any sense. Even if he (Fred) had to be convicted, it would raise a lot of dust and even chaos in the country. Just wait and see.
The case of chiluba can be compared to the thugs at Kamwala Inter-City Bus…
…Station. Look, if I was a lawyer and president for that matter, those thugs at Kamwala wouldn’t exist. Anyone who has used this station would see what am talking about and probably they will never use it again if they come from abroad where law rules and not humans.
Every rat has got it own day. finally let them show.
How much much have we spent on these cases? How much have we recovered? we must know
Cage the buggers man!whay are you taking long to convict them?
at least the bugger has learnt..stealing is bad!!!!…what chaos naimwe…kafupi has only cowards mimbulu backing him..
Ba Peter mwafuntha?
CRUCIFY THEM!!!!!!!!!!
Ba Peter, Which chaos are you talking about?You know what people like you need to be shot in the ass to stop contributing useless and inciting statements to the media.You need to be interrogated where you got this interrigent report from.
#3, what dust and chaos would convicting a thief raise? Only those who worship thieves and criminals would dare raise dust and from the way you are talking I can tell you are not one of them. Like you, I would also have liked to see a speedy and fair trial for these alleged plunderers.
the problem that we have with our tasks force is that they are so excited in persecuting few individuals of theft yet they do not have substancial evidence.When these cases started we were told that ftj will not last an hour but surprisingly he is still surviving.It seems the man is innocent and this all fight against corruption is fake.
Max Nkole should be fired if we want anything out of this Task Force which has itself become so corrupt and is cutting deals behind our backs. Katumbi billions of dollar, and I hear Mahtani is negotiating to payback US$250,000 out of the carlington deal. So what is this nonsense, he is just giving Chiluba more impetus.
hahahahahahaaaaa!!! kafupu just pleaded guilty!!what does that mean?he should go behind bars!
Na HK na # 1 mwafuntha.
I would like to hear from all of you nice (and some nasty) people here when FTJ&Co are cleared.
This whole court issue is begining to irritate me mwe!!!!!! Uh……nalema nazo. Asembe it’s just someone ordinary this whole issue would have been buried by now, it’s not like they are the only ones that plundered – Thousands of more people are out there scort free. Please get over and done with this as now it seems we are spending more than what we want to recover.
Malaika iwe!! What is your real name? All things being equal let the law take its course. In all probabilities the magistrate should have found the man without a case to answer, but as things stand an acquittal is very remote
Drop all cases against Dr. Chiluba or else….
else what????
or else Katumbi ANZAULULA VONSE!!!
Y shld corruption cases against kafupi & clonnies b dropped?Let justice prevail in this matter.
Viva plunders, let Nchito and Nkole make a fortune out of this circus
I hope justice will be served
Kafupi is smart guys upto now no conviction.The chap is always ahead of the task force and they want to negotiate with a thief.Wasting money this task force
Yes, why not?? If they negotiated with Moses Katumbi,why not with our own – Chiluba and others?? They should just negotiate,capwaa so that we start a new chapter.
Please mwe bantu, note that it is in this govt where there is more rampant corruption than before. Ask Rev.Shikapwaza and Shaka Slaughter man…….they are part and parcel of the inner circle.
Please leave FJT alone mwe bantu imweeeeee!!!
Why was Katumbi let off the hook?? The guy was paid about $25Million by Govt to buy arms we have never seen and the chap has not paid back the money.Imagine what that money would do to some poor people in Lukulu,Chilubi island,Pemba etc.The guy should have paid back with interest.
Zambian judges and lawyers should be ashamed… what a profession, imagine if a Doctor took 5 years to treate one patient or an engineer taking 5 years to design one machine.. we’re tired of you. set ISO standards to adhere to..
# 26. Chinyo chako Sakala
then all fiture plunderers and corrupt officals will know that they only have to agree to negotiate to be let off.
If i was in an influential postion , i would be thinking Why not take a chance with corruption knowing we can talk if i get caught ???
#8 AK47, no sina funte. I was initially excited about Mwanawasa coming to legally lockup these thieving chaps. However, not anymore. I have just realized that actually its either they have no proof to convict him and the case has so many loop holes in favour of chiluba and others, or worse still the case has implicated many key figures who are even still in govt and it would be embarassing on the part of govt to deal with the case accordingly. I am not speaking for anyone. But, if we were to be told how much money the case has consumed we may find that it is by far more than we are supposed to realize from the conviction. And thats how justice has been denied to zambians. In fact…
…to be honest, i lost interest in the whole thing it wouldn’t bother me if he were to be set free by discontuing the trial. This is how i can also close my books of interest in the case and start to contribute on issues that can develop our beautiful country, Z. Put it this way buddy. There are so many pipo who have been (maybe) purposely set loose and they have even become powerful and therefore, intouchable. I am a progressive individual who can’t stomach time-wasting. I like moving on with time. Because time is money.
Hang them!!! Crucify them!!! Let them pay for what they did to Ronald Penza, Dean, Paul Tembo etc
Please someone get rid of these thugs – Chiulba and his associates. We cannot afford having such rotten eggs among us in Zambia. Why is there no swift justice when we all know that these thugs were very fast fingered at grabbing anything in sight for themselves from the innocent public? Why is our justice system criminal-friendly and not focused on cleaning up the rotten eggs from circulation?