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Cops have hijacked Kapoko's case, complain ACC officers

Cops have hijacked Kapoko's case, complain ACC officers
Written by George Chellah

OFFICERS at the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) have complained that the Zambia Police has hijacked the investigations and prosecution of former Ministry of Health human resources manager Henry Kapoko.

Well placed sources within ACC on Wednesday revealed that the officers were frustrated with the engagement of the Zambia Police to take over the investigations and prosecution of Kapoko.
"We feel frustrated that investigations we have been carrying since February on Kapoko's activities in the Ministry of Health together with other people have been hijacked by the police with the motive that appears to bungle this case in court so that Kapoko and others could go Scot-free," the source disclosed.

"From the time we [ACC] exposed this, instructions are coming from above. In the last few days there have been instructions for ACC to handover the case to police because police will take lead both in investigation and prosecution."

The sources said the police rushed in effecting the arrest on Kapoko.

"We find this undesirable in the sense that police don't seem to be interested in checking everything ACC has been doing in Kapoko's issue. Instead, they are rushing to effect arrest and from the way the police are proceeding it's clear that a lot of work hasn't been done and we will not be surprised if acquittals are recorded in these matters," the source said. "But we are frustrated and disappointed because we initiated these investigations and broke the news to the public, the police hijacked the process and they are not doing a number of things to ensure that they have a good case before the court of law.

"Our fear is that when acquittals start coming the public will blame ACC as having failed and not the police because as far as the public is concerned it's ACC handling the cases and not the police."

The sources further disclosed that some ACC officers even threatened to pull out of the case.

"Between Monday and Tuesday some ACC prosecutors had even threatened to pull out of the prosecution because the police through its Lusaka division prosecutions officer insisted that they will lead the prosecution," the source explained.

"But our prosecutors from ACC are qualified lawyers so they threatened that they will pull out of the prosecution because according to the Law Association of Zambia (LAZ) Act qualified lawyers can't be supervised by public prosecutors who are not qualified lawyers."

The source said the ACC was determined to do a thorough work on Kapoko's case.

"We have taken long in concluding the investigations because these where not simple investigations considering the fact that Kapoko's name was not appearing in most transactions. Although we understood his connections to those transactions that's why we wanted to do a thorough job so that we have a solid case," said the source.

"But now the police are rushing in effecting arrests and some of the charges we are hearing about are very shaky. So we will not be surprised when acquittals start coming our way."

Labels: ACC, HENRY KAPOKO, POLICE CORRUPTION

posted by MrK @ 3:25 PM