MWILA BEMOANS ECL’S HARASSMENT BY THE JIT
Former PF Secretary General Davies Mwila has charged that the New Dawn Administration is abusing former president Edgar Lungu through Investigative Wings.
This comes after the Joint Investigative Team put restrictions on Crest Lodge which is located off Twin Palm Road in Lusaka’s Ibex Hill area owned by the former first family.
The restrictions have been put on allegations that the lodge is property believed to be proceeds of crime.
PACRA records show that Chyeso Lungu of NRC number 119188/10/1 and Jasper Katete of NRC 895984/11/1 are the directors and shareholders of the company, but investigators believe that the former president is the beneficial owner who only used his daughter as a front.
“The procedure is that there is supposed to be a gazette notice, inviting the owner of the property under investigation to claim it. If no one claims it, then repossession takes effect. In terms of that property, it is registered under the former president’s daughter of course, but it has been under investigations for some time and the findings are that the beneficial owner is actually him. So it’s an on-going investigation,” said the source.
Commenting on the development and some recent arrests of his close associates, Mwila said in an interview that Lungu was to blame because he had been too quiet in the face of all the injustices.
“It is him president Edgar Lungu to blame, because how can [President] Hakainde Hichilema place him on house arrest, that is house arrest, he can’t move, he can’t talk, how can a former president, the UPND government manages to grab your lodge, how possible is that? He (President Hichilema) has seen weakness in Edgar Lungu, if it was me, they can’t even manage that, because the former president has presidential immunity, so what the UPND government is doing is illegal, they can’t go and grab a lodge from a former president, no! Not only that he owned that lodge when he was a minister,” he said.
“For a long time, he has been a lawyer, I can’t blame HH, I have to blame Edgar because he has been too weak, he has been too quiet and you can’t run your life like that. Me, I can fight back because you see, the former president has immunity, how can he be mistreated like that and he is just watching? No! That is unacceptable and what government is doing is illegal, because if they want to grab any property from the president, they know the process, they are supposed to go to Parliament and establish prima facie if the former president has any case, then Parliament will decide.”
He insisted that grabbing property was illegal.
“They started slowly, they started with close associates, after that they went to the children, after that they went to the wife. Immediately, he was supposed to know that next, it is him, me I can’t accept. This thing of grabbing property is illegal, this law that they are implying, the one that they are saying property suspected to be proceeds of crime is abuse of the law. What that means is that even you, they can pounce on you and say where did you get this motorbike, so this is an abuse of the law,” Mwila said.
“But I can’t blame [government], I have to blame Edgar Lungu he is former president, how can he be mistreated like that and he is just watching? He has the immunity, so whatever they are doing, it is illegal and he is supposed to stand up and challenge it. He is a lawyer, he knows, so this is not new. We knew that it will come to Edgar Lungu and it is coming. These guys, the agenda is to fix people, one year, one month they have just been fixing people instead of fixing [the nation].”
Mwila said Lungu was behaving like he was on house arrest.
“I am not happy because president Edgar Lungu has kept quiet, he is just like he is on house arrest, he can’t talk, no! These are politics, they are playing politics and when they are playing politics, they have to talk. The UPND are vindictive, they are personal, they are following people, they are political. Because Edgar Lungu is quiet, they want to take advantage, a former president is a politician, he must speak out!” exclaimed Mwila.
When contacted, Joint Investigations Team spokesperson Rae Hamoonga said he needed to confirm whether Crest Lodge had been seized.
(Credit: News Diggers)