KAMPALA – The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) will appeal the weekend’s Constitutional Court orders that quashed all corruption proceedings against Geoffrey Kazinda, the former Principal Accountant in the Office of the Prime Minister.
Spokesperson Jackline Okwi says that the office will appeal to the Supreme Court the decision of the Court of Appeal acquitting Mr. Kazinda and two others for embezzlement and conspiracy to defraud.
“The Office of the DPP has moved the Attorney General to appeal the decision of the Constitutional Court in Constitutional Petition No. 30 of 2014 by Kazinda Geoffrey against the Attorney General, to the Supreme Court,” Ms Okwi told is quoted by the Online Publication, The CEO East Africa Magazine on Monday.
Mr. Kazinda has since 2012 been on trial in various courts for among other cases, constructive possession of financial instruments, forging receipts and invoices, false accounting, making fraudulent payments, conspiracy to secure money outside authorized disbursement procedures, and living a standard of life beyond his known source of income.
But in 2014, Mr. Kazinda appealed to the Constitutional Court seeking, among other orders, court to declared that the act by the DPP to split charges against him and subsequently having him charged variously for offences built on what his lawyers said was the same facts, which had earlier been decided by court, as unconstitutional and a violation of his rights.
In a 3-2 majority judgment, the Court declared that the manner in which Kazinda was brought to court without giving him a chance to handover and to appear for audit and in Parliament was unlawful and contravened Article 28, 44 and 17 of the Constitution.
The Court held that the acts of the DPP and the Police in endless investigations in respect of Kazinda are illegal and an abuse of the laws provided for under the Constitution.
In the lead judgement, Justice Stephen Musota held that Mr. Kazinda proved his case and ordered the stay of proceedings against him. He directed the Anti-corruption Court to immediately discharge Kazinda on the current cases and any future cases whose offences are founded on same facts.
Justice Musota was supported by justices Geoffrey Kiryabwire and Cheborion Barishaki.
Justices Kenneth Kakuru and Ezekiel Muhanguzi disagreed with their colleagues.
In his dissenting ruling, Justice Kakuru said Kazinda still had a chance to plead the same objections at trial in the Anti-Corruption Court and said that his application did not require constitutional interpretation.
In an October 17th 2014 affidavit sworn by the current Director of Public Prosecution (PPP), Jane Frances Abodo, then a prosecutor, in response to Kazinda’s constitutional court appeal said the act and conduct of the DPP and other government agencies charging and prosecuting of Kazinda with various criminal offences does not in any way violate the petitioner’s rights under the 1995 Constitution.
She further stated that Criminal Case No. 105 of 2012 and Criminal Case No. 47 of 2013 were founded on different facts, different transactions and the other accused persons are different from those in Criminal Case No. 138 of 2012 in which the petitioner was charged alone and convicted. That the petitioner was availed the documents at different trials.
