IT IS MALICIOUS FOR DEC TO ALLEGE THAT MY PROPERTIES ARE PROCEEDS OF CRIME

IT IS MALICIOUS FOR DEC TO ALLEGE THAT MY PROPERTIES ARE PROCEEDS OF CRIME

…when as a successful business executive for many years, we had capacity to borrow over $2 million from FNB long before I joined politics, Malanji tells court

Lusaka… Friday March 14, 2025

IT is not only out of excitement but also malicious for the Drug Enforcement Commission (DEC) to allege that the three houses that I bought in Lusaka’s Silverest Gardens are reasonably suspected to be proceeds of crime when my capacity and source of funds is well documented, former Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Malanji has said.

Malanji told the Economic and Financial Crimes Court yesterday that he bought the three houses all valued at K2, 650,000 out of his savings from the salaries, allowances and gratuities when he served as Kwacha Constituency Member of Parliament (MP) and Cabinet Minister.

Testifying in the matter before Lusaka Principal Resident Magistrate Ireen Wishimanga, Malanji said it was an act of excitement for DEC Chief Investigations Officer Kwaleyela Mukelabai to charge him with possessing property suspected to be proceeds of crime when it is a well-known fact that apart from being a successful business executive since 1987, he also served as an MP and Cabinet Minister between 2016 and 2021 where he raised additional funds through salaries, allowances and gratuities.

He was testifying against the allegations on three specific properties—houses No. 033, No. 269, and No. 270—which were purchased at K850, 000, K900,000, and K900,000 all made under his name.

“The source of these funds were my savings from salaries, allowances and gratuities. When you look at all these figures on the three properties, the total comes to about K2.7 million. One was sold at K850, 000 because it was not new while the two were K900, 000 each. So, just my mid-term gratuity alone, I got above a million Kwacha. That is away from another 1.5 million final payment,” Malanji said.

“Besides, as Foreign Affairs Minister, I travelled a lot and I was saving my allowances. So the charge of possessing property suspected to be proceeds of crime or questioning where I got the money to buy those houses is just out of excitement. In fact, it is malicious.”

He explained that it was easy for him to save all his earnings as an MP and Minister to buy properties because some money that came from his businesses were able to cater for all the expenses at home.

Below is part of the verbatim in court:

DEFENCE LAWYER: Kindly tell the court who Joseph Malanji is.
MALANJI: Joseph Malanji is a 60-year-old business executive who previously served as an elected Member of Parliament for Kwacha constituency from 2016 to 2022, and also Minister of Foreign Affairs between 2018 and 2021. I also served as one of Zambia’s representatives to the Fourth Pan-African Parliament in South Africa.

Additionally, I was elected as vice president of the Africa Golf Confederation and later became the president.

I started my business in 1987 when we were running buses under the company called JM Bus Services. As you may be aware, in the 80s during the UNIP regime, there was a transport crisis. When I bought my first bus, business was overwhelming, so within a month, we bought a second one, and the trend continued. Within a year, we had 18 big buses with 30 seating capacity. We continued with that business until in the early 90s. After the change of government, UBZ went under and that gave us more opportunities. We even bought some of the buses that belonged to UBZ, we secured 46 AVM buses.

We started growing from there, and between 1994 and 1996, we ventured into other businesses. In 1996, we registered Gibson International. We brought in state of the art equipment for wheel balancing and alignment.

The other section was dealing in power automation. The business was doing quite well such that we were able to make between $100, 000 and $200,000 per month.

We had an opportunity where a company called Farewell Engineering run by a Mr Andrew Kashita, slowed down on the switch gear which they had a franchise for, and just about a year of them slowing down, the demand in the mines escalated and we took advantage of that and our business booming at that time, with the two companies, we were able to shoot beyond a million Dollars.

Between 2000 and 2001, we decided to move the power automation business to stand alone. In 2003, we decided to have an independent outlet just for supply. So we opened a shop along Independence Avenue which we were renting from the Workers Compensation Control Board. The building is located in Kitwe, plot number 1326.

Then in 2001, we incorporated Gibson and Gibson Company which is named after my late father. Gibson and Gibson is an incorporated company with a certificate of incorporation.
In 2009, Workers Compensation Control Board indicated to us that they were intending to sell all their houses in Kitwe to siting tenants including a few business buildings, and by virtue of us being sitting tenants, we were given the first offer to buy the property. After receiving the formal offer letter in September 2011, we sourced for funds and did a down-payment as commitment fee, and began renovating the property.

In January 2012, we were summoned to the office of the then Minister of Labour Fackson Shamenda and told that we were required to make full payment before March that year.

In February 2012, we made full payment of K 1.919 billion (unrebased) as confirmed by the original signed confirmation that has been presented before this court. Upon full payment, we requested the board to do the change of ownership considering that they were the ones to pay taxes and do conveyancing.  Purchase is when money changes hands. Conveyance was academic, and they took time to give us a title, which came out in March 2013.

We finished renovations around April/ May 2012. When we finished renovations, we made a decision that we must have an anchor company which will run the hotel because we renovated the premises to suit hotel facilities. We put in furniture. And proceeded to register a company in the hospitality industry in the name of Royal Gibson Hotel.

DEFENCE LAWYER: who are the owners of premises?
MALANJI: It is owned by Gibson and Gibson, a registered company by way of title.

We decided to have a driving vehicle company which would run the hotel and that’s when we registered the Royal Gibson Hotel and the company started running the hotel.

From the early days, we could see that the business in that industry was good, so we decided to expand the room capacity at the back of the hotel. So we decided to go to the bank to get a loan that would facilitate the expansion and renovations of the hotel because the new setup included having a lift since we needed to have multiple storage.

In our initial borrowing, we thought $1,000,000 would be enough. We went to FNB, which  requested for a collateral, and we gave them Gibson and Gibson a third party guarantor and included the Continental Lodge in Riverside and the loan $1,000,000 was disbursed.

We then noticed that Holiday Inn had already been given land to build a hotel nearby so we decided to slow down on the expansion as we considered other business ventures to help us have a good push for repayments.

DEFENCE LAWYER: there is an allegation that you possessed the Gibson Royal Hotel, property reasonably suspected of being proceeds of crime. What is your comment?
MALANJI: To start with, there is no property in question which is in my name. The property on stand number 1326 in Kitwe is owned by Gibson and Gibson Company. And that property has never been a property of proceeds of crime because at the time it was bought, I was very far from the doors of the government.

DEFENCE LAWYER: there is also an allegation that you were in possession of properties—houses No. 033, No. 269, and No. 270 in Silverest Gardens which are reasonably suspected to be proceeds of crime, what is your comment?
MALANJI: To start with, even the dates are wrong. When the houses were offered to us in December 2017, we got excited and jumped on the opportunity. We were approached by vendors who came to Parliament to market the houses, telling us that once you make a deposit, they would give you the house and you immediately begin getting rentals.

Then in February 2018, I got a K300, 000 loan for furniture but all that money was deposited towards the purchase of the same property in Silverest Gardens and started collecting rent.

So by 2020, these houses had gone through a number of tenants including students. They were being used as boarding houses for students. I was converting the rentals as payment towards their purchase. Payments started in 2018 and kept paying.

I was Minister of Foreign Affairs, and when you travel in that capacity, you are Secretary of the State and apart from the Addis Ababa summit and United Nations, the rest of the places I touched, everything was paid for by the host country. Meaning my per diem was spared.

Besides, I was hardly in Zambia for two weeks. I was always out of the country and per diems varied from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs when I travelled as Secretary of State and I would get from Cabinet if I was representing the President. Thus, the source of the funds were my savings from salaries, allowances and gratuities.

Besides, as Foreign Affairs Minister, I travelled a lot, sometimes as the special envoy of the President and Cabinet would pay me $3,500 per day. I was saving all my allowances and salaries for a rainy day. So the charge of possessing property suspected to be proceeds of crime or questioning where I got the money from to buy those houses is just out of excitement. In fact, it is malicious!

The matter has since been adjourned to Monday, March 17, for continuation of defense.