Convicted Chinese wildlife trafficker Yunhua Lin will return to the High Court in Lilongwe on Tuesday as the court continues hearing his application for bail in a corruption case.
Justice Redson Kapindu, sitting in the Financial Crimes Division, has set September 1, 2026, for the continued hearing of the bail application.
The development comes after the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) told the court that it is reviewing whether to continue prosecuting Lin.
Lin’s lawyer, Powell Khutabasa, had asked the court to discharge his client from the case, saying the State was no longer willing to prosecute him.
But ACB lawyer Christin Khunga told the court that the prosecution is reviewing the matter following Justice Kapindu’s ruling of July 13, 2026, which dealt with the State’s earlier attempt to withdraw the case.
The State is now considering whether to facilitate Lin’s discharge under Section 247 of the Criminal Procedure and Evidence Code, discontinue the proceedings or continue with the prosecution.
Justice Kapindu granted the State more time to complete the review before the court considers the discharge application.
The case has previously attracted controversy after the Director of Public Prosecutions, Fostino Maere, instructed the ACB to withdraw the proceedings.
Maere had represented Lin as a lawyer before his appointment as DPP.
The case had already gone to trial, with three of the 18 witnesses prepared by the prosecution having testified when the State sought to withdraw it.
The Department of National Parks and Wildlife (DNPW) said it had not been consulted over the decision and described the attempted withdrawal as a setback in the fight against wildlife crime and corruption.
During the latest hearing, the court also dealt with two affidavits filed by the State which appeared to take different positions on Lin’s discharge.
An affidavit sworn by ACB lawyer Peter Sambani on August 18 opposed Lin’s discharge application.
A second affidavit sworn by lawyer Ngwambula Nundwe on August 20 appeared to take a different position.
Both lawyers said they were acting on instructions from the Acting Director General of the ACB.
The conflicting positions prompted Justice Kapindu to seek an explanation.
The judge said the affidavits appeared to contain “conflicting, or indeed diametrically opposed positions”.
Kapindu said evidence filed under oath before a court cannot simply be ignored because a party later changes its position.
Khunga told the court that the Acting Director General had changed his position after new information emerged and the case was reviewed.
He said the intention was for the August 20 affidavit to replace the earlier one, but the first affidavit could not be retrieved because the court file was already with the judge.
He attributed the situation partly to “a miscommunication” in preparing the first affidavit.
The court accepted the explanation and allowed the State to proceed on the basis of the August 20 affidavit.
Kapindu, however, said the better approach would have been to formally withdraw or replace the earlier affidavit to avoid ambiguity on the court record.
The State told the court that it does not oppose Lin being released on bail, but wants strict conditions imposed to ensure that he remains available to face the proceedings.
The court remains concerned about the possibility of Lin fleeing.
Kapindu referred to previous decisions in which Lin was considered a flight risk.
These included a High Court ruling delivered on November 7, 2025, and a Supreme Court of Appeal decision of March 15, 2024.
In both cases, the courts found that the interests of justice favoured his continued detention.
The parties have now been asked to come up with “novel” and stricter conditions that could address the court’s concerns.
“The Court thus wondered whether the parties could think of other novel conditions that would assure the Court of a firm guarantee that the accused person would no longer be a flight risk,” Kapindu said.
The parties have asked for more time to study the previous court decisions and prepare their arguments.
The bail application will be heard on Tuesday, September 1, 2026, at 10am in open court.
Lin remains in detention as the ACB reviews whether to continue with the prosecution, discontinue the case or facilitate his discharge.
