By NATION REPORTER
NO one stole government money to fund Patriotic Front (PF) campaigns in the August 12, 2021 general elections, the party’s former General Secretary, Mr Davis Mwila has said and that targeting him in his personal capacity over the party’s campaign funds was unprofessional and unfair.
Mr Mwila was speaking in an interview when he reacted to Drug Enforcement Commission (DEC) Director General Mary Chirwa who said “we’re not probing PF funding but the possession of funds one can’t explain.”
Mr Mwila said that it was unfortunate for investigative wings to implicate him in being in possession of money suspected to have been proceeds of crime or were stolen from government to fund the former ruling party’s campaigns.
But Mr Mwila said that the wild allegations were alarming and very malicious because they were hitting snags since it was evident that no one had stolen any money from the government.
Mr Mwila said the allegation that he had campaign money in briefcases was far from the truth.
“You ask them if it is me let them produce evidence like the deposit slips, the bank show the time date and even phone numbers of the people that make deposits,” he said.
Mr Mwila said that the onus was on DEC to prove that he was in possession of money he had failed to account for because his signature did not appear anywhere on the transactions.
But Mr Mwila said Ms Chirwa was being used by the UPND to harass members of the former ruling party.
He said they were not being professional and it was clear that they wanted to malign him over campaign money.
Mr Mwila said that he was aware that the reason Ms Chirwa was acting like this was because her contract was coming to an end and therefore needed to prove a point.
He said his conscience was clear because there was no paper trail leading to him.
Mr Mwila said the problem was that the UPND government had created an impression that the PF were thieves.
He said the party was not even obliged to give details of its campaign funding because the constitution did not allow that.
