LUNGU SHOULD JUST SHUT UP
The Scoop Editorial:
YOU see, the problem we have with Edgar Lungu is that he is allergic to peace and this is why he has not desisted from his old-school, party-spoiling arrogance of yesteryears. This is why each time an opportunity avails itself to him to open his mouth, he simply messes up.
Edgar has shamelessly continued to mess himself up by exhibiting the same stubbornness which made Zambians boot him and his Patriotic Front (PF) thugs out of power and therein lies the poison which makes his mouth his own enemy.
We have a lot of respect for Edgar as former Head of State but his behaviour is so off the tangent that almost a year after losing to the UPND, he still can’t believe he is out of power and this is where his bitterness is coming from.
We find it illogical and absurd that today, Edgar has the infantry to even issue sentiments like “I handed over power to this other “guy” so that Zambians can make a comparison in terms of leadership” and that many people had told him to resist handing over power because of low quality leadership aimed at prosecuting others.
If good leadership is about arming cadres to maim opponents and recklessly borrowing and plunging the country into economic turmoil; if quality leadership is about segregating people based on their tribe and incarcerating those with dissenting views, then we are better off under a low quality leadership that upholds the rule of law, peace, unity, and promotes equality among Zambians.
Yama, Zambia is not your kraal that you can decide what to do to which animal and you get away with it. Zambia is a democracy that thrives on the rule of law unlike what you subjected us to when you were in power and the rule of law stipulates that those who make the law must obey it as they are bound to be treated in the same way as the rest of the citizens and handing over power is not a presidential privilege but an obligation when you lose.
Even President Hakainde Hichilema will have no choice but to hand over power in 2026 should he lose and if he does so, it will not be because we owe him anything but because the Zambians have spoken. Edgar cannot expect us to eulogize him on account of him handing over power.
Those who were misleading him by asking him not to hand over power are the same people who misled him by consistently lying to him that everything was alright and that the Zambians were happy with his brutality, caderism, and arrogance. This is why he did not see it coming that he was going to lose an election.
What Edgar is doing is the case of the wicked fleeing when no one pursues them according to Proverbs 28:1 and he should not equate it to political prosecution because Zambians have not forgotten the pain he inflicted on his opponents using the same institutions he is today blaming. Edgar was a ruthless dictator who cared less about how others felt as long as doing so benefitted him and to hear him whining like a child today over the summoning of his wife is laughable to say the least.
He claims that it is him they are after; yes, if he stole, they must pursue him to the conclusive end. For now, all the country wants to know is how his wife got those 15 mansions and this is not a bad idea. All his wife needs to do is tell the investigative wings where she got the resources to build those structures. Is this hard to ask for?
If she was brewing kachasu, she should just tell us how many gallons of kachasu she was brewing per month and how much she was making and how much it cost her to build the said structures and then those investigating the matter will come up with a conclusion as to whether her explanation makes sense or not and if there will be a prima facie evidence of wrongdoing, she will be taken to court to prove herself. It is as simple as that.
Esther has never worked anywhere where she could get all that wealth. She was just a housewife before becoming the First Lady, with no traceable income generating activity that could help her build these structures. Others are claiming that she was married to a lawyer and that it was possible for her to build these structures but which earth-shaking cases did Edgar handle and win under his law firm?
How much was he even making from his practice? If our memory serves us right, the only popular story about this same law firm was the fact that Edgar swindled a widow. Actually, by the time Edgar became actively involved in politics, his law firm had already closed.
Edgar himself was a sorry sight up to the time he was appointed minister, with oversized jackets and Kamwala pairs of trousers and only became a smart guy after becoming president. So, why wasn’t money from the law firm buying nice clothes and building nice structures for his family but only did so during or after his presidency? To us, the issue of the law firm makes no sense and those peddling this narrative must be knuckleheads.
If Edgar was making such huge amounts of money, how come others close to him are saying he, at one time, was staying in a garage? No one is saying Esther stole and no one is judging her as such but she is just being investigated and only the courts can vindicate her.
Edgar can cry from Jericho to Jerusalem but it will not change anything. These rants will not help him and his family in any way. Instead of trying to vilify HH and painting him a bad guy, he should appreciate the fact that normalcy has returned to Zambia ever since we kicked him out of power such that right now, he can attack the Head of State and still go home and sleep on a confortable bed. Imagine it was HH spewing such hatred and Edgar was still in power, was HH going to breathe another day?
The problem with Edgar is that he thinks Zambians owe him anything. Sir, those who owe you are the cadres you were empowering at the expense of deserving Zambians and not an ordinary Zambian who felt the effects of your tyrannical reign. Even when you say you are ready for anything, you know deep down your heart that you are just making noise to try and shield your family from being investigated.
You have nothing and you know it. You have no backbone. You can’t even stay a week in police cells where you threw others before you break down. You can’t even brag about political influence because you have none. If you had any political influence, you would not have been butchered like a toddler in last year’s elections.
Your wife or children are not special animals. If former presidents were investigated and some of them ended up in courts of law, why should the story be different when it comes to your wife? That arrogance will not take you anywhere and if your handlers are serious, they would have stopped you from facing the media each time you make a public appearance because you will continue crying and nothing will change.
We hope you now fully understand what you made others go through because you were a dictator in your own right and you crushed a lot of innocent people, all because it served you and the PF right. If you were a serious person, you would not have been crying today because your victims suffered 10 times what you are going through today when you were at the zenith of power, that time when you listened to nobody.