Home Affairs Minister Edgar Lungu said the former president was not allowed to fly to Johannesburg because there was a travel ban on him and moreover the Attorney-General had not been furnished with copies of the court order from the Lusaka High Court.He said Banda was stopped because of fears that he might interfere with investigations into the two charges he is facing."Mr Banda is currently being probed on various allegations of public interest some of which require gathering information from witnesses outside the country. If Mr Banda is allowed to go outside the country, there is a high likelihood that he may tamper with evidence and witnesses or sabotage investigations altogether," he said.
Lungu said he had only learnt of the court order through the media and no copy had been availed the Attorney General and that seemed his strongest point."So this morning, our officers were in a dilemma. They did not know what to do," he claimed.Other reports were that the trip had been shot down because of a sense that South Africa was "uncooperative" on matters relating to the former president's trial. Banda's son, Henry, is on the police wanted list and believed to be "somewhere" in South Africa or Mauritius, where the former ruling Movement for Multiparty Democracy (MMD) party's materials for the 2011 elections were printed.The Lusaka High Court had on June 6 released the former head of state's passport and allowed him to travel to South Africa for the African Presidential Roundtable of the Boston University's African Presidential Centre.He was due to make a presentation and moderate one session.But Immigration officers would not process his papers to board the early morning Lusaka-Johannesburg flight on June 7. They still would not do so even when shown the high court order allowing him to travel.
