Maravi

The future doesn't belong to the faint-hearted

The future doesn't belong to the faint-hearted
By Editor
Friday February 23, 2007 [02:00]

IT gets dark sometimes, but the morning comes. There is no need to surrender. Suffering breeds character. Character breeds faith. In the end faith will not disappoint. This is the way we feel about the conviction of former health permanent secretary Kashiwa Bulaya. There is no doubt that Bulaya has been fairly and justly convicted for theft of public funds and abuse of public office. There is also no doubt that the funds he has been prosecuted and convicted for stealing are just a small fraction of what has been stolen. This criminal abuse of public funds must be brought to an end.

It was not easy to get Bulaya prosecuted because his friends in government tried everything possible to ensure that he was not prosecuted. There was an attempt by Director of Public Prosecutions Chalwe Mchenga, the then Attorney General George Kunda who was also the justice minister, and also by President Levy Mwanawasa himself, to protect Bulaya from prosecution. It took a month-long protracted struggle to make Levy yield and allow Bulaya to be prosecuted; it took the use of very hard language to make this government allow Bulaya to be prosecuted.

But Bulaya’s case and his conviction raise a lot of questions about the integrity of our criminal justice system. It raises serious questions about the independence of the Director of Public Prosecutions. What happened in the Bulaya case, over the nolle prosequi that was granted to him, raises serious questions about the behaviour of those who occupy the office of Director of Public Prosecutions. In Bulaya’s case, it is very clear that the decision to enter a nolle in his favour was not an independent decision of the Director of Public Prosecutions, he was merely fulfilling the wishes of the President and his justice minister.

We know that in every society throughout history, those who administer the criminal justice system hold power with potential for abuse.

We are not in any way trying to say that the Director of Public Prosecutions should not enter nolle prosequis. What we are trying to say is that he should do so in an independent way, a way that is consistent with the constitutional powers given to this office.

Our Director of Public Prosecutions will have serious difficulties convincing anyone that he had acted independently in this matter. And this is confirmed by his open collaboration with State House to try and spin a lie over Bulaya’s nolle prosequi. Mchenga signed a joint statement with Darlington Mwape and Solicitor General Sunday Nkonde which was full of lies and untruths about Bulaya’s nolle prosequi.

Why did he do this? Why did he join this web of deceit? Is this a sign of someone who is acting independently?

Every state must have the power to maintain order and punish criminal acts but the rules and procedures by which the state enforces these laws must not be arbitrary and subject to political manipulation by those in power.

Abuse of power, in any form, should not be tolerated and should be fought without respite whenever it occurs or signs of it start to show.

Again, now that the Bulaya case is over, we reiterate our demand for the release of Sokoni’s letter. Why are we demanding Sokoni’s letter to be released to the public? We are not demanding the release of this letter just for the sake of it.
We want to remove deception, crookedness and lies from public life and the politics of our country. We know that Levy and his minions did not act in an honest manner over this issue; they acted in a very treacherous and dishonest manner. We know it is hard to understand their behaviour, but sometimes painful things like these happen. It is all part of the process of building a nation.

And this is not just a matter of oversight on the part of Levy. It was a deliberate action taken to perpetrate an injustice. They knew very well what they were doing and they had calculated everything. This was not just a matter of style. Of course the truth is that in many aspects of politics, style and substance complement each other. Very often, there are two sides of the same coin.

Some people may wonder why we should continue demanding Sokoni’s letter when the issue is over and Bulaya has been convicted. The key issue in this matter is not Bulaya’s conviction; it is dishonesty in public life, in the discharge of public duties - it is corruption on the part of Levy and his minions. Dishonesty is corruption.

It is not only the stealing of money that constitutes corruption - dishonesty is also a fraud that can harm a nation and it must be detested and punished in the same way as the stealing of public funds.

Levy and his minions lied to the nation that there was no sufficient evidence in the Bulaya case for it to be successfully prosecuted. But Bulaya failed even to put up a defence. The only defence he wanted to rely on was of accusing the trial magistrate of unfairness or bias. We all know that this was nonsense because the matter was conducted with sufficient fairness and integrity.

Actually, the one who lacked fairness and integrity was Bulaya himself. This shows that there was much more to the entering of a nolle prosequi of Bulaya. It wasn’t a clean nolle. We know that the Director of Public Prosecution shas no obligation to explain his nolles to anyone. But this is not a blank ticket for any Director of Public Prosecutions to abuse our criminal justice system through the use of nolle prosequis. If this is found to be so, the Zambian people have every right to question any nolle prosequi so entered. Nolle prosequis were made to serve a legitimate cause and not to be used as a vehicle for corrupt deals with criminals like Bulaya.

We therefore demand the release of Sokoni’s letter so that the Zambian people can know for themselves if in any way Levy and his minions had betrayed public trust in the Bulaya case. And as we continue to demand the release of this letter, we give our most humble thanks to all our people, wherever they may be, who never hesitate to join just causes and denounce crookedness and corruption.

The future belongs to the courageous like them; it does not belong to the faint-hearted; it belongs to the brave, to those who can stand up against injustices; to those who are daring.

Labels: EDITORIAL, KASHIWA BULAYA

posted by MrK @ 3:37 AM