People whose murder cases are awaiting the availability of funds at the Legal Aid Bureau should keep their fingers crossed as, almost two months after the bureau suspended its representation of suspects in murder cases, there is no indication that finances will be made available anytime soon.
The Legal Aid Bureau, established after passing of the Legal Aid Act in 2010, has been bed-fellows with financial hiccups, a development that last year culminated in delays to pay salaries for its director, Masauko Chamkakala, and his deputy.
The financial problems seem to have reared their ugly face again this year, forcing the bureau to suspend the task of footing the bills for suspects who are too poor to afford legal representation.
Chamkakala said in an interview that non-availability of resources remained one of the challenges facing the bureau.
He was, however, quick to point out that the bureau had not stopped offering free services to the resource-constrained murder suspects.
“What has happened is that, due to lack of finances, we have suspended the representation of murder suspects. But it is not true that we have stopped offering such services or suspended the same a long time ago.
“It is only last month and this month and our hope is that we will resume offering these services once the situation improves. What happens with homicide cases is that we work as a project and what we have done is to inform our friends in the judiciary to suspend the project for the time being,” Chamkakala said.
The bureau, which is an independent entity, could, however, not be drawn to comment on when the funds were expected to be available.
Chamkakala maintained that the suspension of such a service was a temporary situation.
Meanwhile, the Malawi Law Society (MLS) has raised concern over the situation.
“The Society [MLS] has learnt that as a result of the acute funding challenges, the Bureau has suspended its defence of homicide suspects. The consequence will be that some of these people will spend even longer periods of time in pre-trial custody,” John Suzi Banda, MLS president, and Khumbo Soko, its honorary secretary, said in a statement.
MLS described the development as “a serious violation of the rights of detained and accused persons”, urging the National Treasury to provide the necessary funding.
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