Batifyanta pa mukosi, there is no rule of law – Antonio Mwanza

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Antonio Mwanza
Antonio Mwanza

Batifyanta pa mukosi, there is no rule of law – Antonio

By Thomas Ngala(The Mast)

SOCIALIST Party deputy general secretary Antonio Mwanza has bemoaned the “unfairness” in the application of the law.

“President Hakainde Sammy Hichilema has not condemned what his youths are doing. He has not condemned the statements that are coming from his leaders. He has not condemned the behaviour of his political party cadres,” he says. “President Hakainde Sammy Hichilema was the first to give us a signal. So, now, batifyanta pa mukosi (they have squeezed us by the throat). There is no rule of law.”

Mwanza said when he featured on Millennium TV on Thursday that the rule of law entails that “all of us must be treated equally irrespective of where we are coming from and irrespective of our standing in society”.

He recalled that UPND promised restoration of the rule of law adding that what Zambians are seeing is the opposite of what the UPND promised.

“For instance, just this afternoon today (Thursday), we saw hordes of UPND cadres marching to the Drug Enforcement Commission where former president Edgar Lungu and the former first lady [Esther] were appearing. The police had blocked the whole place. The UPND cadres went there to cause disruption of what the Drug Enforcement were doing just to hurl insults and threats on president Edgar Lungu. If that was youths, cadres from the opposition Socialist Party, all of us could have been arrested,” he said. “But the police were watching and left them to do what they were doing. We have seen for instance that UPND leaders of Southern Province, North Western Province, Lusaka, Copperbelt, they have been having press briefings where they have insulted leaders of the opposition. They have threatened to sort each one of us one by one. They have even reached a level where they ask the President to say ba President tulelombako kuti mwatupelako fye amaka (Mr President, give us the power), we want to go and sort out these people.”

He lamented that the police are not moving to arrest those people.

Mwanza also said that immediately anybody from the opposition issues a statement, the police will go in and arrest, detain and charge them.

He also charged that “we have seen an increasing number of abductions.”

“First it was our young sister Pamela Chisupa and 12 other girls that were abducted. It took the work of the community to have those girls rescued. We, as the Socialist Party, have seen a number of our candidates abducted. We had nine by-elections recently…and our candidate for Kabompo, two candidates from Gwembe, were abducted, including our candidate from Luangwa, a young girl aged 22, got abducted. We reported the matter to the police,” he said. “We presented the evidence and there is nothing that the police have done. If that happened…if it was the opposition political party, Socialist Party that had abducted somebody from the UPND, police would have moved in, arrested whoever was involved and as we are speaking now, the matter could have been in court. But nothing has happened. We have seen the violence and threats, intimidation that is going on, including hate speech, because now hate speech has only become hate speech if you talk about a certain region. But if another person from that region speaks ill of people, it is not hate speech.”

Mwanza said “we have seen for instance, ba secretary general for UPND, ba Batuke Imenda calling Archbishop Alick Banda as Lucifer. And that thing even when it was reported to the police nothing happened”.

“We saw ba Minister of Education ba Douglas Syakalima calling the entire Bemba people as a tribe that they are suffering from poverty of the mind. And yet, even after this was reported to the police, it has not been classified as hate speech and the police have not moved in. We have seen ba minister, ba Hon Charles Milupi issuing threats and illegal instructions to the UPND youths to sort out anybody who disagrees or who criticises President Hakainde Sammy Hichilema and the police have not moved in to arrest Hon Milupi,” he noted. “We have seen my brother, my comrade, my friend, a colleague, Cornelius Mweetwa, we as Socialist Party reported him to the police over his confession that he was behind the tribal remarks of president, comrade Chishimba Kambwili.”

Mwanza said to date, the police have not done anything on the case in question.

He described what Zambia has under the watch of the UPND not as the rule of law but the rule of the jungle where the UPND cadres can threaten, beat people and “abduct people and nothing happens.”

Mwanza said Zambia has reached a level where the Inspector General of Police Graphel Musamba is telling political players that he will not allow anyone to have a public procession.

He complained that these are fundamental rights within the Constitution where everybody must have the right to assemble, the right to have a rally, as long as that gathering is peaceful.

“The right to assemble has been taken away from us. They have even gone to the extent of threatening you, the media, my bululu Thabo Kawana is on record threatening the media houses with closure if you don’t behave according to what they want,” he recalled.

Mwanza accused President Hichilema as the one behind the selective application of the law.

“In all these things, President Hakainde Sammy Hichilema has been quiet. He has not condemned what his youths are doing. He has not condemned the statements that are coming from his leaders. He has not condemned the behaviour of his political party cadres. And we understand as SP, we understand why he does not condemn. President Hakainde Sammy Hichilema was the first to give us a signal. So, now, batifyanta pamukosi (they have squeezed us by the throat). There is no rule of law,” said Mwanza.

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