Consulting Engineering firm Brian Colquhoun, Hugh O’Donnell & Partners – BCHOD Zambia whose shareholding is majority held by Zambians has challenged the Engineers Institute of Zambia – EIZ to reveal what exact details led to their membership being suspended.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with the Zambian Business Times –ZBT, BCHOD Managing Partner George Sitali said EIZ had suspended them without giving them an opportunity to be heard. “We don’t even know what the charges are and what they have been suspended for, EIZ has a process we’re members are written to and given time to respond if there are charges” Sitali told ZBT.
Sitali said EIZ did not at any point inform or write to us concerning the suspension of our membership. We are hearing this from the press statements and queries just like this. EIZ has processes on how to handle issues and we have not been engaged.
A further investigation by ZBT has revealed a political twist in that Sitali is the husband to constitutional court judge Annie Mwewa-Sitali who was appointed during the former ruling party – the Patriotic Front – PF regime. She is a prominent Judge and has handled highly sensitive cases and this may be the reason why the husbands company may be targeted.
Sitali when asked to confirm if he was married to a prominent lawyer who was being investigated as per tip received by ZBT, he confirmed that he is married to Constitutional court Judge Annie Sitali but he was not aware of her being investigated.
EIZ has suspended the membership of the BICON and BCHOD, both consulting Engineering firms following the irregularities revealed after a government appointed Joint Investigation Team – JIT invited the EIZ Technical Committee to review the issues surrounding Society House Tower building and the Ndola Mufulira Mukambo road construction projects.
BCHOD is of the view that it was wrong for EIZ to suspend their membership without the due process of being heard. The BCHOD Consulting Engineers Managing Partner said it was very difficult for him to give further comments as they were not informed of anything.
He said EIZ need to reveal to them the illegalities that have been found. “The rules of natural and fair justice demands that when you accuse someone, you need first to inform them before anything is done, but that was not the case.” He said.
He added that BCHOD Lawyers have since written to the EIZ to ask for what the charges are and share more details on everything that has transpired to arrive at the decision to suspend their membership.
After the above connection and relations, it’s now not clear if it’s the government’s JIT which initiated the review of these projects which has concluded that both BICON and BCHOD are guilty. EIZ confirmed that the institution was invited to be part of the investigation but the process of arriving at the verdict after the investigation has not been made public.
