JOE Mwale, a senior citizen, has charged that if Chitimukulu, the paramount chief of Bembas, continues being “stubborn”, a dossier against him will be unpacked.
He says he cannot be intimidated to impulsively reveal the dossier he holds against the paramount chief.
Mwale and Chitimukulu have traded newspaper barbs over the past two days.
On Tuesday, Mwale told The Mast that he has a damning dossier against Chitimukulu.
He said what he knew about the paramount chief borders on a foreign power and that he was set to expose him.
Recently, Chitimukulu was prominently in the media over what he could have said, not said, meant or not meant on Kasama radio, in Northern Province, about the voting pattern of the Bemba people.
Other people are denouncing Chitimukulu as having made ‘tribal remarks’ while others are defending him that he only encouraged Bembas to vote en mass, like the way the people of Southern Province do.
“If I had to reveal something about Chitimukulu, the whole country will rise against him. There’s something that I have, with tangible evidence, about his plans and if I were to expose him…. One day I’ll expose him and the whole country will have to know the true character of Chitimukulu. It’s something serious but I’ll keep it for another day,” promised Mwale.
“I’ll expose him and say ‘this is you, this is what you said to me and not anybody else.’ What he said is very serious and involves a foreign power. He said it and the witness I have is that foreign power. But I’m keeping it for another day. A day of reckoning will come when he will be exposed. I don’t want to engage with his royal highness senior chief Mukuni in the public but I’ll meet him. He doesn’t know what I know about Chitimukulu.”
But on Wednesday Chitimukulu called this reporter and said: “I want you to write that I want Joe Mwale to disclose!”
“I knew him through my brother Colonel Chanda and then through BY (Benyamin Yoram) when he was [a] member of Zambia Republican Party. I have never had some close relationship with him (Mwale),” said Chitimukulu.
“So, I want him to disclose to the nation what he knows about me. Tell him to disclose so that the nation knows about me. There are no secrets he must hold – he must disclose everything he knows about me so that the nation can know. He says he has even witnesses in foreign powers, isn’t it? So, tell him to disclose and also disclose those foreign powers.”
Mwale, reacting to Chitimukulu’s challenge, said they knew each other some three decades ago.
“I came to know Chitimukulu through his younger brother, Colonel Chanda Sosala in Kafue in 1990. The younger brother was a member of parliament for Kafue but the brother is not involved into this particular subject,” Mwale said.
“The issue is that I have a dossier against Chitimukulu. He also claims he has a dossier on [James] Lukuku, forgetting that others also have a dossier on him.”
Asked if he was merely trying to frighten the paramount chief or his allegations are binding, Mwale responded: “look, at my age I cannot just come and start fabricating stories. I’m over 70!”
“I’m a self-made person; no one can say I go for something…. If I do something, it’s on principle. Nobody can say I owe anybody anything! It’s not money I’m saying what I’m saying – I stand on principles. I’m not for sale, you understand?” he said, with rage.
“So, if I have something on somebody, it means I have got something on him. I’m saying that before my Creator; I have to say the truth all the time. I cannot just come out of the blue and make a story that I have a dossier on that one. I can only say so when I have a dossier against you.”
Mwale underscored that he could authoritatively say that: “I have a dossier against paramount chief Chitimukulu and it’s not a lie.”
“I say so before God – I cannot tell lies. I’m a self-made person! I depend on whatever little God has given me, my wife and my children, we’ll feed on that and not someone giving me money,” he said.
“The dossier I’m talking about is not about what he did at the time I knew him. It’s for recent times. We are not talking about 1990. I know Chitimukulu and there are no two ways about it. He also knows me! He can’t speak like we only met in 1990 and in between we have not sat together. No! I have seen him.”
Mwale, a former ambassador, noted that when one had a dossier against somebody, disclosing it was under the holder of such a report.
“At my own pace, depending on how he goes – if he continues what he is bringing now – I’ll go ahead and expose him. But it’s not mandatory that I have to do that. No! I’ll do it at my own time; at my own pleasure. It’s up to me,” Mwale stressed.
“So, let him know that there is no law that says that I must mandatorily bring it out and so on. If he wants he can go to court and say this and that… kwamana (that’s it)! He can’t be challenging me to do this and that. No! You can tell him that ‘I’m not a liar.’”
He insisted that nobody could pay him to engage into lying.
“Not me! I’m self-made. He (Chitimukulu) has no power over me – only God, my Lord, and my Saviour Jesus have powers over me. There is no one who can force me under the sun that do this and that. At my own pleasure; when it’s convenient for me to do that, I’ll do it,” explained Mwale.
“If he wants to continue, let him do so. But all he must know is that I have a dossier against him and nobody can intimidate me over that. It’s a dossier, which is under lock and key! When it’s absolutely necessary, if he is going to be stubborn, at some point I’ll snap. I’ll reveal it to the nation. But it’s up to me; he cannot dictate to me that ‘do this and that’. No! If he doesn’t know what it is (the dossier), he has forgotten, I still remember – something happened.”