Former senior leaders of the Association of Pentecostal Churches of Rwanda (ADEPR) on Tuesday, June 22 returned to court after prosecution appealed against a 2018 decision by the Nyarugenge Intermediate Court to acquit them of embezzlement-related charges.

In the case, 12 leaders including Bishop Jean Sibomana, the former legal representative of the church, Bishop Tom Rwagasana his deputy, Christine Mutuyemariya who was in charge of administration and finance, among others, are being accused of having mismanaged and embezzled funds totaling up to more than Rwf5 billion.

It is alleged that they committed these offenses between 2015 and 2017.

In 2018, the case was heard by the Nyarugenge Intermediate Court, which acquitted all defendants.

However, prosecution appealed against the decision.

Appearing before High Court for the appeal hearing on Tuesday, prosecution told the judges that their decision to appeal was based on the fact that the Intermediate Court did not consider key evidence while acquitting the defendants.

Among the evidence, according to prosecution, is an audit report that shows a number of financial mismanagement tendencies in the former ADEPR leadership, in addition to other incriminating evidence like financial documents and witness accounts, among others.

The prosecutor in charge of the case gave a number of examples to court, including services that were paid for by the former leadership but there wasn’t any proof that these were delivered.

In addition, the prosecutor claimed that Sibomana’s leadership was characterized by breaching ADEPR’s financial operation regulations, where among other things they awarded tenders to people in ways that were not right.

On Tuesday, only one defendant – Sibomana – managed to present his defence to the court, where he mainly challenged the audit report, saying it lacked objectivity since it was entirely compiled without his team’s participation.

"Almost everything that prosecution is accusing us of is derived from the audit report. However, this is unfair because we did not participate in the audit process,” he said.

In fact, it looked like the defendants did not want to carry on with the process of the trial before a new audit is done, in which they are given a chance to participate and answer several questions related to the way they spent the denomination’s funds.

Court took some time to listen to both the defendant’s and prosecution’s arguments in regard to the issue and later deliberated that the trial should continue, saying that the decision about whether the audit report is admissible in court will be taken at the end of the trial when the final verdict will be read.

The case is expected to continue on Monday and Tuesday next week (June 28 and 29) as more defendants will be heard by the court.