Revealed: Police officer demanding bribes to release thugs

Investigations done by Malawi24 have revealed that a top officer at Chinamwali police unit in Zomba demands money from thugs in order to release them from police custody.

According to sources privy to Malawi24, the officer releases all the suspects who pay money to him.

“The range is from K4, 000 to K10,000 and the suspects are released at night so that people should not notice anything and this has led to people around the police unit to stop trusting the police unit,” said the source.

The source added that criminals in the area do not fear the law enforcers bearing in mind that their money will bring justice for them.

However, Malawi24‘s effort to reach national police spokesperson Nicholas Gondwa for comment proved futile as he was not picking his mobile line after several attempts by this reporter on Wednesday.

The development follows cases of mob justice in the country that have seen suspects being torched to death by people who caught them.

In an article that Malawi24 carried last week, many Malawians blamed the police for incidences of mob justice arguing that most officers work hand in hand with thugs in the country.

These findings can be ameliorated as a study conducted by Afrobarometer revealed that Malawi police officers are the most corrupt in Africa .

In the report, the Pan-African research network revealed that the Malawian law enforcers have held to the record for the fourth year running now.

The report named ‘People and Corruption: Africa Survey 2016’ states that Malawi is one of the countries in which police officers receive bribes to “ignore crime”.

“You can pay off police officers to ignore any crime, however horrific and devastating it’s just a matter of price,” reads part of the report.

Ironically, in Malawi, the report says, two thirds of those that took part in the research believe that corruption has gone up for the year just ending because police officers take a role in it.

Malawians involved also were part of the 35% of respondents on the continent who openly said they would not report corruption to necessary officials because they fear of landing themselves in trouble.

The study reveals that 9% of the respondents in Malawi blamed government for being slow to fight corruption with 64% believing that it is the citizenry’s role to redress the situation.

The survey, which was conducted in 36 countries from March 2014- September 2015, according to a published report by the African Independent, involved up to 43,143 respondents who all gave out their experiences and perceptions of corruption in their respective nations.

(Additional reporting by Joseph Dumbula)