🇿🇲 BRIEFING | Kambwili Accuses UPND of Disrespecting Bemba Royalty, Urges Protest Vote in Kasama
Patriotic Front member Chishimba Kambwili has accused the UPND government of showing disregard for the Bemba Royal establishment and the wider Northern Region, using the death of the wife to the Paramount Chief Chitimukulu as a political rallying point ahead of the January 29 Kasama mayoral by-election.
Speaking in Bemba on Radio Mano, Kambwili said the absence of Hakainde Hichilema and Vice President Mutale Nalumango from the funeral was evidence of disrespect, arguing that sending five ministers did not amount to adequate recognition of the Bemba Royal establishment.
He framed the issue as regional neglect and urged Kasama residents to punish the ruling party at the polls.
Kambwili also attacked UPND over delayed farmer payments, describing the government as dishonest and disconnected from rural suffering, and linked the grievance to broader claims of economic failure.
The remarks mark a shift toward explicit regional mobilisation. They come weeks after opposition figures criticised President Hichilema for what they described as divisive messaging, following his remarks in Choma urging voters to support him to avoid a return to cadre violence in Lusaka.
Critics at the time warned against ethnic framing in politics.
With days to the Kasama vote, the rhetoric underscores how the by-election has become a testing ground for regional grievance narratives, even as national leaders caution against ethnic polarisation.
© The People’s Brief | Chileshe Sengwe
This fella is non repentant…anyway, imputi isula taibula kubwekeshapo
Mr. Kambwili is incorrigible. He has not learnt anything from his incarceration.
His biggest enemy is his mouth.
To use the funeral of the paramount chief Chiti Mukulu’s late spouse as a campaign issue is truly uncouth and inhuman. It is sewer politics.
Mr. Kambwili is the one who has direspected the Bemba royalty.
Umwine wa cisushi at it again
Elements like Kambwili are promoting tribalism to find their space near the treasury.
Abena Kasama, Bushe ababantu filya baibile bali Myakanyako?
Bushe kwena muli amano mufilesosa bakambwili? Ilykeni mwebena Kasama.
Landeniko ifyo mukabombela abantu bane.
Ilukeni bane, abena Kambwili nibakandile fye
When people have nothing of substance to contribute the often resort to attacking. In the Oppositions case is becomes personal. To get under your skin so you react. This is why its important for the regime to rise above this kind of pettiness. They dont relent as we have seen. The issue bounces from the lips of one opposition member to the next. That is their currency.
Kambwili seems not to have reformed and one wonders what it will take for him to learn.
The death of his two brothers should have been an eye opener. We in their support for him met their fate.
From pretending to be too sick to stay and serve his term. He bounced from prison to hospital wards. Even wasted the courts time seeking sympathy.
What is even more sickening is the lengths the man will go to carral tribal leaders in his divisive tribal diatribe. The Paramount Chief of the Bemba lost his wife this past week. As of yesterday praised government for standing with him in this trying time.
One would ask, among the royal court. Are there no tribal elders to rebutt the statement? Abena Ngandu; silence would be ensorsing the kind of shallow divisiveness that we have seen the clergy, Kambwili, Mwamba, Mmembe and opposition leaders as a “check and balance” while being silent on the real issues that plauge our vulnable.
This brand of politics is bent on being destructive and when one doesnt respond tge illerate get the impression that the utterances are true.Seems out courts have not done a good job in getting Kambwili to reform. Lord help us what he will subject well meaning Zambians who work so hard to better this country while misfits like him tear it down.
This is the man who can’t campaign with issue based campaign, he makes sure tribalism is part of his speech.