Xavier gets 6-month jail sentence

Xavier gets 6-month jail sentence
Written by Laura Hamusute
Tuesday, December 30, 2008 1:13:50 PM

FORMER Zambia Security Intelligence Services (ZSIS) director general Xavier Chungu has started serving a six-month sentence after failing to raise K500 million that the court ordered him to pay as penalty for jumping bail.

The state issued a warrant of distress for Chungu to serve six months after he failed to pay the K 500 million within the 14 days that the court ordered.

On December 9, 2008, Ndola High Court Deputy Registrar Jones Chinyama, sitting as magistrate in Lusaka, slapped the K500 million fine on Chungu for jumping bail in 2004.

Chinyama ordered that Chungu pays the said sum within 14 days from December 9, 2008 or go to jail for six months.

This was in a matter in which Chungu was facing contempt charges for jumping bail.

In 2003, he was granted bail of K500 million with two working sureties in his own recognisance but Chungu fled the country and thus did not appear before court at the scheduled time.

The state then made an application for a bench warrant to be issued against him, which was granted and this bench warrant remained in full force till he returned to Zambia on December 3, 2008.

Chungu, through his lawyer Nicholas Chanda, told the court that he fled the country because his life was in danger.

But in making the ruling, magistrate Chinyama described as unacceptable and contemptuous Chungu's behaviour, ordering him to pay the sum in question.

Meanwhile, magistrate Joshua Banda has set January 26, 2009 as the date of commencement of Chungu's forgery trial.

This is in a matter where Chungu is, on the first count, charged with forgery. It is alleged that Chungu on dates unknown but between October 1, 2003 and November 30, 2003 in Lusaka with intent to deceive, did forge passport number ZH 88471 purporting to show that it was issued properly when in fact not.

On the second count, he is charged with falsifying a document contrary to Section 352 of the Penal Code CAP 87 of the Laws of Zambia.

Particulars of the offence are that Chungu on December 3, 2008 in Lusaka knowingly and fraudulently did alter the passport in question to Mary Bwalya, an immigration officer.