A Malawian court on Monday put Vice-President Cassim Chilumpha under house arrest for allegedly plotting to kill President Bingu wa Mutharika by hiring South African hitmen.
”I have no option but to tilt the scales of justice in favour of granting bail to the three accused persons subject to stiff conditions,” high court judge Charles Mkandawire said, referring to Chilumpha and two others arrested with him.
Chilumpha will be ”confined to his official residence and will not leave his house without authority from the president” until the treason trial finishes, the judge said.
He also has to surrender his passport, pay a $2 000 bond and has been barred from making overseas calls on his official cellphone ”to avoid the suspicion that he would be communicating with the would-be assassins”, the judge said.
Chilumpha and tycoons Yusuf Matumula and Rashid Tembo, both allies of former president Bakili Muluzi, were detained and accused by a minister of plotting to kill President Bingu wa Mutharika.
Chilumpha had been sacked by Mutharika in February but the president was forced to reinstate him following a court ruling.
The vice-president was arrested on April 29 and charged with treason and conspiracy to commit murder.
Prosecutors had objected to bail, saying it should not be accorded to treason suspects, who if found guilty can face death.
Chilumpha appeared unfazed and told reporters later:” I am being persecuted because I refused to join the DPP,” or President Mutharika’s Democratic Progressive Party.
Mutharika founded the DPP after quitting former head of state Muluzi’s UDF party which had put him as its presidential candidate in 2004, the third multi-party presidential polls for the poor Southern African country.
Chilumpha is also challenging the government for dismissing him as vice-president. A constitutional court is still to hear the case. – Sapa-AFP