Malawian Ex-President Refuses To Face Tax Fraud Questioning

Malawi’s former president, Peter Mutharika, has refused to allow the national anti-corruption body to question him about allegations of tax fraud.

Under Malawian law presidents are entitled to import goods without paying tax, but eyebrows were raised when $6.6m (£4.8m) worth of cement was purchased tax-free in 2019 using President Mutharika’s exemption code.

It later transpired that some aides of the former president were using the president’s tax exemption code to import goods

The latest statement from the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) says it intends to interview the former president, but he released his own statement saying he had a right to remain silent.

In his statement, Mutharika claimed he had already been questioned by police over the matter last August. In it he also accuses ACB of pre-emptively freezing his bank account as part of “a sustained political witch hunt” that is “intended to humiliate and taunt me psychologically”.