POLICE ORDERED TO SEIZE MARWICK’S PASSPORT

MBABANE - Member of the Royal Swaziland Police have been ordered to take a passport belonging to Lobamba Member of Parliament Marwick Khumalo.
The interim order calling upon Khumalo to return his passport to the police was issued by Judge Mpendulo Simelane.

High Court Judge Mumcy Dlamini recently issued an order that the legislator should be allowed to attend Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA) meetings to be held in London next month. The office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), however, filed an appeal.
Khumalo has been invited to London to attend the following forthcoming meetings: Trustees meeting from September 9-10 and The Audit sub-committee meeting starting from September 10-13, 2014.
The legislator is expected to first get a visa entry clearance from the United Kingdom’s Embassy in Pretoria and is expected to arrive in London on September 7, 2014.

The order calling upon Khumalo to return the passport comes after the DPP ran to court where he contended that the legislator was now in possession of his passport, which, under his conditions, had to be kept by the police.
The DPP is represented by Senior Crown Counsel Macebo Nxumalo.

In his founding affidavit, Sipho Mthethwa from the Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) stated that on August 14, 2014 Khumalo applied for an order allowing him to travel to London to attend CPA meetings.
He submitted that following the notice motion on August 15, 2014, Judge Mumcy Dlamini granted the order as prayed for by Khumalo.

“On August 19, 2014 the DPP filed a notice of appeal against the order granted by Judge Dlamini. The reason behind the appeal was that the DPP was not satisfied with the judgment made by Judge Dlamini, therefore, there was a need to maintain the status quo ante pending finalisation of the appeal,” said Mthethwa.

Mthethwa, who is the principal investigator in the CPA fraud case, further stated that he had been accordingly advised that the rules of the court by their nature had the effect of staying the execution of the court order of the trial court.
“The respondent (Khumalo) is already in possession of the passport and under the prevailing circumstances the applicant (DPP) should directly cease these documents without an order of the court. The applicant will also have no other remedy once the respondent leave the court’s jurisdiction,” he stated.

He alleged that this matter was urgent by virtue of the fact that if Khumalo was allowed to continue to be in possession of the passport he may be tempted to leave the jurisdiction of the court at any time and defeat the purpose of the appeal lodged by the DPP.

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