The Lilongwe Senior Resident Magistrate’s Court yesterday granted the State its wish to add Fisd Limited Company on the accused list. 

Four Fisd directors were arrested in November 2020 but were only formally charged Last July last  year in a case they are accused of receiving double payment for the same work in a project financed by the African Development Bank (AfDB).

In an earlier interview, State advocate Pirirani Masanjala said they had applied to the court to have Fisd added to the case because the payment was made in the name of the company.

Some Fisd officials at court yesterday

The accused directors are Moses Chirambo, Frank Mwenechanya, Kondwani Nanchukwa and Arthur Mpama. Apart from the four directors, another accused is Daudi Kaunda, an accountant in the Ministry of Agriculture.

During the court session yesterday, the defence also appealed to the court to make a formal order to the State to produce documents in relation to allegations that Fisd induced the double payment.

According to the defence, any payment that the AfDB would make must have supporting documentation; hence, the State must share this evidence to prove inducement on the alleged double payment.

One of the defence lawyers Burton Phiri said “this documentation is crucial and we raised this issue from the start. The State must produce this piece of evidence that the bank was induced to make the double payment and we pray that the court will make this order”.

So far the State has paraded two witnesses from Sustainable Rural Water, Sanitation Infrastructure for Improved Health and Livelihood, the project implementation unit.

The project cordinator Kondwani Msowoya in his testimony whose  testimony considered the double payment as an error.

“When we noted the error, we wrote the contractor about it,” he said.

The case continues today and is being heard by senior resident magistrate Florence Msekandiana.

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