CONTEMPT PROCEEDINGS OVER BILL 7 RETURN TO COURT AS CONSTITUTIONAL SHOWDOWN DEEPENS

CONTEMPT PROCEEDINGS OVER BILL 7 RETURN TO COURT AS CONSTITUTIONAL SHOWDOWN DEEPENS

By Brian Matambo | Lusaka, Zambia

Celestine Mukandila and Munir Zulu, acting through their lawyers Makebi Zulu Advocates, have taken the lead in reviving contempt of court proceedings against the Speaker of the National Assembly, members of the Select Committee, and the Minister of Justice over the continued processing of Bill 7 in defiance of a Constitutional Court judgment.

The fresh application was filed on 12 December 2025, following clear procedural guidance issued by the Constitutional Court after an earlier attempt was struck out on technical grounds. The court did not dismiss the substance of the complaint. Instead, it directed the applicants on the correct legal framework for commencing committal proceedings for contempt. Armed with that guidance, Mukandila and Munir Zulu returned to court with a procedurally compliant and legally fortified filing.

Although public broadcaster ZNBC reported the dismissal of the earlier application on 9 December 2025, that report did not reflect the full legal position. The matter was not extinguished. It was recalibrated. The present proceedings are now properly before the competent Constitutional Court and squarely address the court’s earlier concerns.

In the court documents, the applicants accuse senior parliamentary authorities and Members of Parliament of deliberately reintroducing and processing Bill 7 despite a binding judgment delivered in June 2025. That judgment declared the amendment process unconstitutional and ordered that the correct procedure, including wide public consultation, be followed.

The Statement in Support of the Notice of Motion is blunt in its language. It states that the alleged contemnors “have proceeded to reintroduce Bill 7 on the floor of the National Assembly, and formed a committee to review the said Bill with the intention to have it passed as law,” conduct which the applicants describe as “a blatant disregard for the authority of this Court” and “highly contemptuous and disrespectful to this Honourable Court.”

Responsibility is carefully individualized. The filing attributes specific roles to the Speaker in appointing the Select Committee, to the Minister of Justice in communicating the intention to reintroduce the Bill, to parliamentary officials in facilitating sittings and disseminating information, and to Select Committee members in actively reviewing a Bill that the court had already found to be improperly processed.

By placing individual constitutional actors at the centre of the alleged defiance, the application removes any suggestion that this is merely an abstract institutional dispute. It frames the matter as a direct challenge to whether court orders in Zambia are binding on all arms of government, including Parliament.

Through the actions of Mukandila, Munir Zulu, and their legal team, the Patriotic Front’s posture is unmistakable without being stated. The party is not watching from the sidelines. It is pressing a constitutional argument that Zambia’s legal order must be respected and enforced, regardless of political convenience or legislative momentum.

As the matter returns to the Constitutional Court in proper form, the question before the bench is stark. Will constitutional judgments be honoured as supreme law, or treated as obstacles to be navigated around? For the applicants, the answer must be unequivocal. Zambia’s constitutional integrity and purity must be preserved and honoured by all.