Many people expected Lungu to be behind bars, says Mweetwa
By Kombe Mataka
MANY people were expecting that former president Edgar Lungu should have been behind bars, says UPND spokesperson Cornelius Mweetwa.
Featuring on Radio Phoenix’s ‘Let the People Talk Programme’ on Tuesday, he said Lungu was still free and there was no talk of lifting his immunity because of President Hakainde Hichilema’s magnanimity.
Mweetwa, who is also Southern Province minister, said currently there was no conversation to lift the immunity of the former president.
“The issue of removal of former president Lungu’s immunity, I am not aware of. And I am speaking as an insider, both as a party spokesperson of the UPND and also as a minister. I sit where the highest decisions for the country are made. There has never been, anywhere, where a motion has been passed either at party level or at Cabinet level to say let us lift the humanity of president Lungu. So we are not privy to such kind of position,” Mweetwa said.
“What I am aware though is that arising from the comments he made, our youths reacted. They reacted rather emotionally because they thought that after how Lungu mistreated HH as leader of the opposition that he could not be allowed to fly in this country, he was told ‘if you fly we will bring down your plane, you have no authority’…When he [HH] arrived in Chipata, he was stopped in town. He had to beg police for two, three hours. He had to escape through the roof at Sun FM in Ndola. That he had to be incarcerated for four months, charged with treason. That he had to be incarcerated in Livingstone for six days charged with murder both of which are non bailable and 14 times arrested and abused like no other before told that by mere of your tribe you can never lead this country. You are not worthy. ‘Oh ok another Tonga can be but not this one’. That is where we are coming from. This (Hichilema) is a President who has a big heart. Many people thought president Lungu by now should have been behind bars.”
He recalled Lungu vowing to arrest Hichilema after the August 12, 2021 elections.
“Contrary to his own proclamations when he said ‘when I hand over power to myself in the next four days I will arrest HH and this time, he is not coming out’. And his henchman Antonio Mwanza said when he gets HH in ‘he will not come back alive, he will die in prison’. This is where we are coming from and these are the realities of the matter,” said Mweetwa. “But we have a President with a big heart. He has decided, let me focus my attention on what matters more to my people. Let freedoms reign supreme. Let those who want to insult me, insult me because there is a law to take care of them and when they are arrested give them bond and don’t arrest them before you investigate them.”