GOVERNMENT says the ongoing anti-corruption drive is “not a
fluke”, but a sustained operation running until the scourge of corruption is
eradicated.
The Government is also urging citizens to be patient with
both the reconfigured Zimbabwe Anti-Corruption Commission (ZACC) and the
courts.
Further, Government says citizens should not expect
everyone arrested to be jailed immediately without being afforded an
opportunity to defend themselves in court in line with the Constitution.
In an interview yesterday Justice, Legal and Parliamentary
Affairs Minister Ziyambi Ziyambi said all processes should be followed from
investigation to arrest and trial.
The interview comes following the high profile arrest of
Environment, Tourism and Hospitality Industry Minister Prisca Mupfumira.
Minister Ziyambi said corruption involved sophisticated and
wealthy individuals who make every effort to erase their footprints, making the
job of investigators complex.
“What is happening is not a fluke, we are determined to
ensure that whoever has a case to answer, they must have their day in court,
which is normal because you can only be proved to be guilty when the due
process has been done,” said Minister Ziyambi.
“I think people should be patient in the efforts that are
being done to try to eradicate corruption. Corruption is a complex thing where
those that are involved have (i) money and (ii) both parties will try to
conceal the transaction.
“So where an arrest has been done, don’t expect a conviction
there and then. Allow the due process to go on and then when nothing has
happened, then you comment.”
Minister Ziyambi said the current fight against corruption
was not a window-dressing exercise meant to create the impression that
Government was fighting corruption, but real war to free society of the cancer.
Fighting corruption is seen as critical in the attainment
of Vision 2030 of an upper middle income status where citizens have decent jobs
and a per capita income of US$3 500.
Minister Ziyambi said given the “lessons learnt” from the
past on spearheading the anti-corruption drive, Government now “certainly has
the passion to do the correct things”. This comes as suspected corrupt people
were previously arrested and later went scot-free after the State failed to
provide irrefutable evidence.
Said Minister Ziyambi: “The President (Mnangagwa) came up
with a new anti-corruption commission. They are doing their work; I think there
is need to give them a chance to prove themselves that they can’t do it.
“Where there are traces that something has been done, there
are procedures that are followed to ensure justice prevails. And this is what
is happening.
“So I do not know why people want somebody to be arrested
today, the trial is conducted the same day and judgment is done the same day;
it has never happened in cases of corruption. Maybe we will be the first
country in the world (to do that) given the very nature of corruption.”
He said corruption was different from a “petty crime of
theft, where somebody walks into the court and pleads guilty. But by its very nature,
corruption cases are complex, you need to ring-fence what you have found, and
ensure that evidence is not tampered with. So these are processes that are
happening and I think members of the public should applaud the (new)
administration that we are now walking the talk,” he said.
Asked why the State invoked Section 32 of the Criminal
Procedure and Evidence Act, which allows it to seek further detention of a
suspect up to 21 days, instead of investigating first in order to arrest,
Minister Ziyambi said the Prosecutor General “would ordinarily be able to
answer”.
“For me, it’s a provision in our law that allows that we
secure certain evidence. In their wisdom, they know why they did it. So I think
the lawmakers, when they made sure we have such a provision, there are certain
safeguards that they wanted to happen. So that question does not arise. The
fact that it is allowed, the prosecutors applied for that provision to be
invoked, means after perusing the documents that he was given, means there are certain
provisions that he wants to do during that specific period,” said Minister
Ziyambi. Chronicle
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