PP ‘buying witnesses’ to implicate Peter, Masangwi
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) is claiming that government is buying witnesses in the Robert Chasowa murder case in order to implicate DPP acting President Peter Mutharika and its Southern Regional Governor Noel Masangwi in the case.
According to an inside source, state authorities are said to have lured Masangwi’s bodyguard only identified as Sam, to implicate his boss in the murder of the fourth year mechanical engineering student at the Polytechnic in September last year.
PP legal affairs director Paul Maulidi, who is also in the Chasowa Inquiry Commission and PP Youth Director Lemani Chapitapansi have been mentioned as the people masterminding the ‘buying’ of the witnesses.
“The picked Sam from Blantyre to Lilongwe informing him that he was going to answer charges in connection with a K26million bank robbery. But when they arrived in Lilongwe, he was asked to implicate Masangwi in the Chasowa case, promising him money,” said the source.
On July 13 2012, Police in Blantyre arrested the two suspects, Geoffrey Botomani and Petro Tembo for Chasowa’s murder and detained them at Soche Police for some days before they were taken to Chichiri Prison.
The development comes when police have been saying such arrests cannot be made while other inquiries on the same case are in progress, arguing that the suspects who were picked recently were involved in the July 19 2012 panga-wielding saga.
Botomani and Tembo’s lawyer, Chancy Gondwe, has filed a bail application at the High Court in Blantyre where the matter has been committed.
Said Gondwe on Wednesday: “We have filed a bail application at the High Court. We are waiting to be given a date to have our bail application heard. My clients are accused of having a hand in the murder of Mr. Chasowa.”
Our source alleges that government has targeted Peter Mutharika and Masangwi.
“The idea behind this is that Peter Mutharika should be stopped from contesting for presidency in 2014 and that Noel Masangwi who is one of the formidable officials of DPP should be caged,” said the source.
The source added that some police officers have tipped DPP about the scheme and that despite the plot; the two arrested Geoffrey Botomani and Petro Tembo have not yet formally mentioned the top DPP officials.
An inquest into the death of Robert Chasowa is underway at the Blantyre Magistrate’s Court.
An autopsy by Dr Charles Dzamalala of the College of Medicine in Blantyre showed that Chasowa died from assault to his head inflicted by a blunt instrument or instruments rather than a fall as was earlier claimed by police that he had committed suicide by jumping from a tall building at the campus.
He was found dead at the college on September 24, 2011.
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