FORMER Commissioner General with Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA), Harry Kitilya and others have petitioned the High Court to challenge the law prohibiting them from being granted bail in the 12bn/- money laundering charges they are facing.
Other petitioners are Shose Sinare, who
is former Miss Tanzania and Head of Investment Banking at Stanbic Bank
and Sioi Graham Solomon, former Chief Legal Counsel to the bank. They
have been joined with one Gideon Wasongo, who is facing a separate money
laundering case.
In the constitutional petition, which
comes up for mention today, Kitilya with his colleagues are challenging
section 148 (5) of the Criminal Procedure Act (CPA), which prohibits
bail to persons charged with money laundering offences.
According to the petition, such
provision is unconstitutional as it violates Article 13 (6) of the
Constitution of the United Republic of Tanzania. Such Article reads, “To
ensure equality before the law, the state authority shall make
procedures which are appropriate or which take into account the
following principles, namely no person charged with a criminal offence
shall be treated as guilty of the offence until proved guilty of that
offence.”
The petitioners are also alleging that
the decision by the prosecution to charge them with the offence of money
laundering was mala-fide (bad faith) and was made with a view of
denying them bail, which is their right guaranteed under the
constitution.
The prosecution is charging the three
accused persons with money laundering, an offence allegedly committed
between March 13 and September, last year, within the city of Dar es
Salaam.
They are alleged to have directly
engaged themselves in a transaction involving six million US dollars by
transferring, withdrawing and depositing money relating to that
transaction in different bank accounts maintained by EGMA Limited at
Stanbic Bank Tanzania Limited and KCB Bank Limited.
The prosecution told the court further
that the accused persons ought to have known that the said money was the
proceeds of a predicate offence, which is forgery. The constitutional
petition is the fourth case to be filed in court to involve Kitilya and
his two co-accused persons.
The first case was lodged by the
prosecution before the Kisutu Resident Magistrate’s Court in Dar es
Salaam. In this case, the trio, apart from money laundering count, they
are also charged with conspiracy to commit an offence, forgery,
presenting false documents and obtaining six million US dollars (about
12bn/-) by false pretences.
The second case relate to bail
application filed by the accused persons before the High Court, which
has not yet been determined, while the third case relate to an appeal
lodged by the prosecution to oppose the decision to nullify the money
laundering count.
On diverse dates between August 2012 and
March 2013, within the city of Dar es Salaam, the three accused persons
allegedly conspired together with other people who are not in court to
commit the offence of obtaining money by false pretences from the
government.
It is claimed that on November 5, 2012,
at Stanbic Bank in the city, all the three accused persons, with intent
to deceive, made a false collaboration agreement purporting to show that
the bank has established a consortium to collaborate with Enterprise
Growth Market advisors (EGMA) Limited.
The purpose, according to the
prosecution, was to arrange for financing in the amount of 550 million
US dollars to the government of Tanzania under which EGMA would arrange
for negotiation and meeting involving the financing facilitate
understanding on the technicalities of the financing to the government.
It is claimed further that EGMA was also
to arrange for review finance documents and facilitate the provision of
relevant documents or approval that would be required by relevant
Tanzanian authorities, the fact which the accused persons knew to be
false.
According to the prosecution, in March
2013 in the city, Kitilya, Sinare and Solomon, with intent to defraud,
jointly and together obtained from the government six million US dollars
(about 12bn/-) by falsely pretending that the money was a facilitation
fee payable to EGMA Limited.
Such amount, it is alleged, was to
facilitate together with Stanbic Bank Tanzania a loan to the government
of the United Republic of Tanzania in the amount of 600 million US
dollars
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