MWANAWASA EXPLAINS HIS FALL-OUT WITH CHILUBA

MWANAWASA EXPLAINS HIS FALL-OUT WITH CHILUBA

On March 23, 2002, Mwanawasa took over as MMD president from Chiluba and began to assert himself as the man in charge of both the party and government. This marked the beginning of what later turned into irreconcilable differences between Mwanawasa and Chiluba. Mwanawasa’s anti-corruption campaign was to prove a defining feature of his presidency and hence his alienation from Chiluba. Presently, things came to a head.

On July 11, 2002, Mwanawasa addressed a special session of Parliament, urging the Members of Parliament to lift Chiluba’s immunity to pave way for his prosecution on corruption, fraud and theft charges. The immunity was later lifted and Chiluba was arrested for theft of hundreds of thousands of US dollars belonging to the government of Zambia. Civil proceedings were also commenced in London aimed at recovering millions of dollars that Chiluba and others were alleged to have stolen from the Zambian people. …

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Mwanawasa recounted the events surrounding his alienation from Chiluba:

In 2002, shortly after becoming President of Zambia, I had fallen out with my predecessor Dr Chiluba. It was a very painful thing. Let me say that despite all his shortcomings, Dr Chiluba was and still is a very close friend of mine. I regard him as my elder brother. He has assisted me in my most difficult times. When I was involved in that road traffic accident, he timely decided that I should be flown to South Africa. About 1996 or 1997, I fell sick and I was operated upon at Lusaka Mine Hospital for prostate cancer.

I was advised that the operation would be done on a Sunday, and on Monday I would be out of the hospital and I would be back in my office on Tuesday. But it didn’t work out that way. Something went wrong and I started bleeding and I was on the point of death. When President Chiluba came to see me in the hospital, I was dying and he decided that I was going to be flown to South Africa for specialist treatment. I refused, saying, ‘I had not spoken to my doctor and maybe the doctor would feel hurt so let me be under his care.’

President Chiluba said, ‘If there is no change in your condition by tomorrow, I am going to have you flown to South Africa.’ That time I was just a practising lawyer, I was not in government. The next day, the presi- dent, my mother and my wife decided that I should be flown out of the country and I was flown to South Africa. I underwent another operation in hospital and I was in the intensive care unit for about four days. After that, I was in the inside ward and after that I was discharged and remained an out-patient.

So you can see that Dr Chiluba has stood for me. And when it became necessary to nominate a presidential candidate for the MMD, I understand that it was Dr Chiluba who proposed my name. So I have a lot of love for Dr Chiluba. But when I came into office as President, documents started coming my way. Some of them existed in government and others were brought to me.

Then I was placed in a situation where I was to decide: was it to be my friendship or closeness to Dr Chiluba or was it to be my patriotism? I was extremely troubled. And President Chiluba himself had not helped matters. I suspected that he was organising articles and adverts in the press against me. Even when I called him to my house, he denied these allegations, but he accused me of not protecting him.

So I asked how I could protect him and from what because I did not know what he had done that I could have possibly protected him from. I told him to give me a list of things I should protect him from and up to now I have not received that list.

In the meantime, my mind kept being troubled. I eventually announced to the nation that I was going to address Parliament. So I addressed the House and told the House what I had seen and I said that in my view these are very serious allegations and since this House does not operate as a court, Dr Chiluba should be investigated and taken to court.

So I left it up to the House to make a decision whether or not to lift the immunity. Eventually, the immunity was lifted and the rest is history.

Some people say I made that decision out of political expediency because up to now the things that I discussed in Parliament have never been proved against Dr Chiluba. But expediency for what? Well, it was said that I was experiencing difficulties in having a grip on the MMD and as a result my governance was being affected. It was said that I generally believed that Dr Chiluba could have been behind that hostility…

Mwanawasa went on to say that he never had difficulties in the party. He admitted having difficulties with former leaders because they had never accepted that Chiluba was no longer party president and would never be president of the country at all. He felt that they had been treating him as just a caretaker. He believed that they expected Chiluba to be calling the shots, with Mwanawasa ‘dancing to his tune’. They did not like the idea that he was his own man, Mwanawasa explained.

Mwanawasa’s conclusion:

But that was not the reason for what befell Dr Chiluba. I may wish to say that I consider myself to be closer to Dr Chiluba than perhaps some of them are. I never foresaw that I would ever end with Dr Chiluba in this manner. In fact, I am even regretting that early morning call. I wish I had accepted my mother’s advice not to come back to politics because it has brought me at an edge with somebody who is very dear to my heart. Perhaps had I not become President that relationship could have continued.

But the position in which I found myself was to ask, ‘Do I keep quiet or do I show that I am interested in this country?’ And if I had kept quiet, I am certain that the people of Zambia, particularly the civil society who started this crusade against corruption, including The Post newspaper, were going to accuse me.

This is why I had to let the professional organs do their professional job without any political interference. If anybody says to you that the politicians or even the President is directing Chiluba’s prosecution, just know that it is not true.

An excerpt from the book: LEVY PATRICK MWANAWASA, An Incentive For Posterity; Pages 146 – 149. By Amos Malupenga (2009).

Picture Caption: The late President Frederick Chiluba handing over power to his successor Levy Mwanawasa at the Supreme Court Building in Lusaka on January 2, 2002.