Former president Joyce Banda has asked the courts to order Mzimba Hora Member of Parliament (MP) Christopher Mzomera Ngwira to return a vehicle and other items she gave him when he was the People\u2019s Party (PP) Provincial Chairperson for the Northern Region.
\nNgwira, who is currently being investigated by the Anti-Corruption Bureau on corruption allegations, resigned from PP and joined the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).
\nAccording to summons filed by Banda\u2019s lawyer, George Kadzipatike, the former president retains ownership of the motor vehicle, a KIA registration number ZA 1457, which was given to Ngwira to ease his mobility challenges when he was a PP member.
\nThe other items which Banda and PP claim Ngwira is clinging to are a mini-bus, three motorcycles, 20 bicycles and party cloth.
\nAccording to the party\u2019s constitution, the items were supposed to be handed back within 14 days after his expulsion on December 14 2015.
\nBanda also denies Ngwira\u2019s claims that she gave him the vehicle as a gift arguing that the party has never relinquished rights over the property in question.
\nBanda, who remains in self \u2013imposed exile after her 2014 loss to Peter Mutharika in the tripartite elections, accused the parliamentarian for using her property for political assignments of DPP which he defected to.
\n\u201cDue to the defendant\u2019s refusal to return the vehicle to the registered titleholder and owner thereof the claimant herein has suffered conversion of her motor vehicle and loss of use thereof,\u201d reads part of the summons.
\nBanda has therefore asked the court to order the return of the vehicle to her or PP and also that Ngwira pays her damages for conversion of the vehicle in question and loss of use.
\n\u201cWherefore the claimant prays for an order that the defendant be condemned in costs of this action,\u201d it reads.
\nWhen contacted, Ngwira said he remains surprised that after dealing with him privately, Banda has decided to take the matter to the public by engaging the court.
\n\u201cI am not clinging to all these things being mentioned, but as at now, I have advised my lawyer and I want Malawians to know the real truth, and appreciate what transpired for me to be found in possession of these things,\u201d he said in a telephone interview Thursday.
\nBut deputy spokesperson for PP Ackson Kalaile Banda said separately that Ngwira has no excuse, especially now that Banda has come in and also after the elapsing of the seven-day ultimatum which he was given a week ago.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Former president Joyce Banda has asked the courts to order Mzimba Hora Member of Parliament (MP) Christopher Mzomera Ngwira to return a vehicle and other items she gave him when he was the People\u2019s Party (PP) Provincial Chairperson for the Northern Region. Ngwira, who is currently being investigated by the Anti-Corruption Bureau on corruption allegations, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":58964,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-58959","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58959","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58959"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58959\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58965,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58959\/revisions\/58965"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58959"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58959"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58959"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}