Zambia is still recovering from the shock it recently received after the news of mass money laundering cartel working under the Zambian government’s nose was uncovered. This cartel of money launderers included some prominent members of the Zambian government, ex-ministers, government contractors and various legal counsellors. Since this news and the list of names were made public, it has been condemned by industrialists and citizens alike. Popular business and philanthropist Dr. Rajan Mahtani also shared his concern regarding this huge money laundering cartel and the fact that it was hidden from government’s scrutiny for a long time.

Inquiry regarding suspicious banking transactions started when prominent lawyers, government contractors were found to make cash transactions of high amount, but were not depositing the same. Instead, it was found that majority of these cash transactions were then wired to accounts in Dubai and China, which had no connection with their work. In a similar manner, it was found that majority these individuals were laundering money amount to almost USD 1 million. When asked about these transactions and the amount of money, these lawyers and government officials defended themselves by saying that the amount is for government constructions such as roads. However, the amount of money found in illegal transactions was too big to let the enquiry stop. This investigation also revealed that the cash transactions have crossed almost one billion US dollars.

Further investigations also revealed startling facts like the illegal money were spent across commodity share trading involving barley, maize etc. Thus, the money came back after the trading looked clean. One of the names that appeared on the top of the list included Masozi Banda, a lawyer from notable law firm Avik International. It has also been suspected that most of these individuals in the list are laundering money for Edgar Lungu. This clears that reason as to why this racket was saved from legal and government scrutiny for such as long time.