Defence lawyers in a K5 billion case involving former Secretary to President and Cabinet Lloyd Muhara and prominent businessperson Leston Mulli have described the detention of the two accused persons as unreasonable.

The two, who appeared before the Chief Resident Magistrate’s court in Lilongwe, were arrested on Tuesday this week and spent a night in cooler before being released on bail in Wednesday after being formally charged.

According to one of the defense lawyers John Kalampa, both Muhara and Mulli are already on court bail as they are answering to other charges.

He said: “They are already on court bail answering to other charges and they haven’t absconded or in any way invaded the criminal procedure so they was no any reason to detain them further because whenever they have been called to come to court, they are going to avail themselves.

There are several ways that you can call them to come to court, arrest is just one of them, the other is just simply just summoning them before court.”

Kalampa also questioned the procedure of prosecuting the matter as criminal saying issues to do with contracts are civil in nature.

“This matter relates to issues to do with contracts and there is no business of criminal procedure of the criminal law and since these people have already been arrested, there is really no necessity to arrest them again,” Kalampa said.

But in his response, lawyer representing the State Levison Mangani argued that the arrest of the two was done within confines of the law.

The two have been charged with two counts of conspiracy to defraud and abuse of office.

Magistrate Chimwaza has ordered the two accused persons to pay a cash bond of K500, 000 each, produce one traceable and reliable surety bonded at K10 million non-cash each and surrender travelling documents to court.

Without objecting the bail application, State Prosecutor Levison Mangani told the court that current charges are withholding ones as substantive charges will be brought at a later date including Director of Public Prosecution’s certification on the abuse of office count that Muhara has been charged with.

The matter has been adjourned to September 15, 2022 for further hearing.