Bushiri’s extradition case adjourned to July 10

Bushiri and his wife attract huge attention on arrival at the court

* The state ambushed us because they served us with a list of six witnesses—Bushiri’s lawyer Wapona Kita

* We came prepared but we heard it in court that the state will parade just one witness who will adopt the rest of the witness statements

By Twimepoki Mangani, Mana

Chief Resident Magistrate, Madalitso Chimwaza has adjourned Prophet Shepherd Bushiri’s extradition case to July 10, 2023 to allow the defence lawyer file a formal application to have the extradition request dismissed and for the state to respond adequately.

The extradition case involving Prophet Bushiri and Prophetess Mary Bushiri returned to court on Tuesday in Lilongwe where the South African government was supposed to parade witnesses as ordered by the High Court in an earlier ruling.

His lawyer, Wapona Kita asked the court to dismiss the entire extradition request because the evidence documents South Africa brought forth were not authenticated as required by law.

“The state ambushed us because they served us with a list of six witnesses,” Kita said. “We came prepared but we heard it in court that the state will parade just one witness who will adopt the rest of the witness statements.

“The Director of Public Prosecutions from South Africa, Sibongile Mzinyathi cannot testify because he is not a witness. The expected evidence was to come from the other five police investigators.”

Kita recalled that the matter had gone to the High Court twice and both outcomes indicated that the witnesses must be authenticated in accordance with the extradition act.

Kita refuted the state’s claims that they as defence are playing delaying tactics while noting to proceed with court’s request to raise all the other objections in the application.

Senior Assistant Chief State Advocate, Dzikondianthu Malunda asked the court to have the defence lawyer make a formal application for the dismissal of the entire extradition request in order to have the benefit of time to respond with the application.

“We were ambushed — we didn’t prepare for that,” he said. “It appears our colleagues had the benefit of preparation and we couldn’t proceed that is why we asked the court, if anything, that such an application could only be made formally hence the file for proper documentation.”

Malunda explained the use of one witness in the case and requested the court to set deadlines for preliminary objections to avoid unnecessary travel expenses for the witnesses.

“We realised in the end that it was possible to parade just one witness who would cover everything by the others. An extradition hearing is not like a full hearing of the evidence. It is a summarised hearing,” Malunda said.