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Two drivers and a business executive of Lusaka who are in court for allegedly engaging in trafficking of 29 unknown male deceased Ethiopians that were found dead in Lusaka have been granted bail of K100,000 with two working sureties each.
This is after the three appeared in the Lusaka magistrate court facing 29 counts.
Meanwhile, the court has committed the trio to the High court for trial.
In this matter, Jairos Njobvu, Stephen Sitali and Pethias Mayembe are charged with 29 counts of prohibition of trafficking in persons contrary to
section 3 ( 1) (4) of the Anti Human Trafficking amendment Act No. 16 of 2022 of the Laws of Zambia .
It is alleged in the 29 counts that Njobvu, 30 a driver at SOS, Stephen Sitali, 35 , a driver of Malaila village , Lusaka and Phythias Mayembe, 43, a business executive of Kabwata Site and
Service in Lusaka between December 10 2022 and December 2022 in Lusaka jointly and whilst acting together with other persons unknown
intentionally did engage in trafficking of 29 unknown deceased male persons of Ethiopian origin.
The trafficking of the 29 Ethiopians resulted in all of them dying .
Read more: UN agencies shocked by discovery of 27 dead bodies of Ethiopian nationals in Lusaka
The matter came up on Wednesday before Lusaka magistrate, Mbuywana Simvula who read the charge to them.
When the matter was called out before Ms. Simvula, the prosecution informed the court that before the matter could proceed, they had an
application to make pursuant to section 213 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CPC) and the application was for the substitution of the
indictment that was earlier before court .
Ms. Simvula substituted the charge sheet to indicate 29 counts instead of the earlier which had one count for all the 29 persons involved .
The magistrate read out the charges to the accused persons and committed the accused persons to the Lusaka High Court to undergo
summary trial after the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) issued a consent order to have undergo trial at High Court .
But defence lawyers from KBF and Partners and other law firms applied to have the accused persons granted bail pending the
determination of the matter and argued that the offences they were charged with were bailable.
They submitted to the court that the application was founded on the provisions of section 123 of the CPC and it was a bailable offence as such, the court should use its discretion to grant the three accused person, bail pending trial.
The court granted the accused persons a bail of K100,000 each, with two working sureties in own recognizance.
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