Chaponda and his co-accused Rashid Tayub have since been granted bail by the Magistrate Court in Blantyre.

Granting the bail, Senior Resident Magistrate Simeon Mdeza ordered Chaponda to pay a bail bond of MK200, 000 and that he should produce two sureties that have been bonded at MK2 million each.

Chaponda and Tayub have also been ordered to surrender their travelling documents.

This has come barely few hours after the same court refused to suspend warrant of arrest for the accused after the defence legal team had applied to the court to invalidate the warrant of arrest arguing the Anti-corruption Bureau (ACB) defiled some conditions in the warrant.

The defence filed three grounds to substantiate its case. It argued that the state through ACB had blatantly as well as disobeyed terms and prescriptions contained in the warrant. The defence counsel also argued that the ACB hugely undermined both the rule of law and the authority of the court.