Johannesburg – Malawi Vice-President Saulos Chilima has been arrested by officers from that countrys Anti-Corruption Bureau.
Chilima was expected to make a court appearance Saturday to face charges of corruption-related offences.
Reports from Malawi say the 49-year-old vice president is accused of receiving kickbacks from UK-based businessman Zuneth Sattar.
He is accused of receiving $280 000 (£230 000) from the businessman “and other items”.
Chilima was later released on bail.
Sattar is a Director of Xaviar Limited and Xaviar Investments Limited, that deals in property investments, with interests that include both residential and commercial properties.
Earlier this year media reports quoted Sattar, the Malawian-born businessman saying he was “not shaken” by the investigation into alleged corrupt dealings with the Malawi government.
The man dubbed the “Gupta” of Malawi insisted “his conscience was clean”.
Sattar was responding to British media on alleged corruption investigations, which the National Crime Agency had been undertaking.
Addressing the British Press on Tuesday, (June 7, 2022), Zuneth said he believed the move was just a smear campaign. to tarnish
By his own admission, Sattar is a “major supplier” to the Malawi government.
He claimed at the time that the public was being “fed with social media lies propagated by some misguided individuals over personal vendetta”.
He said: Firstly, you will note that a lot of what you consider allegations against me is a pack of raw lies circulating on social media and digital platforms that are not credible.
A lot of the stuff written and said about me on these platforms is a collection of lies as they have no basis whatsoever.
However, now that Malawi authorities have arrested the vice president, the social media allegations appear more serious.
