UPND councillor exposed in court

By NATION REPORTER A WITNESS has told the Lusaka Magistrates’ Court how UPND Kanyama Ward 10 Councillor Brighton Bvilumba was reported to police for alleged theft of K53, 600.

Kanyama Ward 10 Development Committee (WDC) chairperson Leonard Cheelo yesterday told Magistrate Felix Kaoma that Bvilumba inflated the number of people that were supposed to be paid by Lusaka City Council (LCC) for distributing bills for land rates arrears on behalf of the local authority.

Mr. Cheelo, 44, said LCC engaged him and 12 others to distribute the bills from 2014 to 2016 on commission basis and that last year, Bvilumba asked them to submit their names to him for payment purposes.

“He told us that the money was ready at LCC. He got our names and took them to the council. It was between August and December and we waited until December 22, 2017 when the money was finally paid out in different amounts through e-wallet.

“But one distributor Daka Mawilili did not receive his money and on enquiring from Bvilumba he was told him to see me. So as a committee we went to the Civic Centre to see the chief accountant,” Mr. Cheelo said.

He said the chief accountant then produced documents showing that Mr. Mawilili had in fact been paid K2, 400.

“We found that there were 35 names instead of the 13 names that we initially submitted. There were even national registration cards numbers and mobile phone numbers. The chief accountant told us that we had been paid according to the period each one had worked,

“We looked at the names of the extra 22 people but we did not know them. Among the 22 names, there were the councillor’s phone numbers of Given Njombi and Isaac Mpongo. We also discovered the name of Agnes Lusenga the councillor’s wife. We then wrote to the Town Clerk to find out where the 22 ghost workers came from but he did not respond to us,” Mr. Cheelo said.

Mr Cheelo said the WDC then decided to report Bvilumba, the only opposition councillor in Lusaka, to Kanyama police.

In cross examination by defence lawyer Paul Katupisha, Mr. Cheelo was shown another list showing that out of the 13, 12 were paid and signed for the money and that it was only him (Mr. Cheelo) who refused to sign.

In response, Mr. Cheelo said he refused to sign because he did not know the source of funds and that the list had 16 names instead of 13, adding that the document showed expenses that were not spent by the WDC office. The matter comes up on August 17 for continued trial.