OPEN LETTER TO HIS EXCELLENCY HAKAINDE HICHILEMA, PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF ZAMBIA
Friday 26 May 2023
My fraternal regards to you Sir.
I have been compelled to write this open letter to you following your very disturbing threats against Her Worship, the Mayor of Kitwe, Ms Mpasa MWAYA.
On Wednesday 24 May 2023, during the handover ceremony of the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) Project Monitoring Vehicles, you the President of the Republic of Zambia, Head of State and Commander in-Chief of the Defence Forces issued very alarming threats against Ms MWAYA for no apparent reason.
Your public admonition of the Mayor followed the initial threats and public humiliation that the Mayor had earlier suffered at the hands of Elisha Matambo, MP Provincial Minister for the Copperbelt Province. This like your admonition was covered by various media houses.
The only crime that the Mayor seems to have committed was to express her personal opinion in a private WhatsApp conversation that she had with her colleagues. The poor lady exonerated herself and explained to the Minister that her WhatsApp posting about “resigning after the press briefing” was not about President Hichilema but someone else. Despite her clear explanation, both yourself and Elisha Matambo, MP chose to use and abuse your positions of power to admonish, humiliate and threaten the defenceless Mayor for no justifiable reason.
Mr President need I remind you that as President, you have no right under the law to gag or threaten citizens from freely expressing themselves. Freedom of expression is a fundamental and an inalienable right enshrined in Article 20 of the Constitution of the Republic of Zambia and no person nor authority has the right to stop any citizen from expressing themselves on any matter concerning them?
Mayor Mwaya just like you and any other Zambian citizen has the legitimate right to express herself and to voice out her concerns on any issue and does not deserve to be threatened or admonished by any one more especially a Head of State and particularly not in public.
Had Mayor Mwaya committed any offense numerous avenues for addressing the grievance could have been invoked rather than such dressing down.
Your public threats and admonition of the Mayor are not only unwarranted and misplaced but gives credence to the many Zambians who have expressed concern over male chauvinistic tendencies of male politicians in general.
Women and girls form the core majority of our population and any deliberate and systematic actions to sideline, fight and talk down on this very important demography is detrimental to the social, political and economic development of our nation.
I beseech all of us to reconsider our attitude and behaviour towards our womenfolk for the good of our country.
We as a party declared that we shall recognize and respect your office as President irrespective of how you treated your predecessors. We also are alive to the fact that Local Authorities are to work in tandem with and under the supervision of Central Government and we have no problem with that.
However remember that on November 8, 2018, you suspended the Kafue Town Council Chairman Thomas Zulu for simply taking part in the “Keep Zambia Clean Campaign” official launch that was officiated by President Edgar Chagwa Lungu.
At that time, you did not consider the fact that Mr Zulu was lawfully discharging his duties as a civic leader, instead you vilified and chased him from your Party.
Further, for all the years that President Edgar Lungu was Republican President, you flatly refused to recognise and respect him as such and yet, today you want to force others to honour and respect you as President of Zambia.
The seeds of hatred, bitterness and insolence that you planted and still continue to plant will one day come to haunt you.
Power is temporary and as President it may be necessary to exercise your authority with love, caution, humility, compassion and a sense of self-restraint as your words and actions carry so much power and may build or destroy the nation.
Your threats are putting the life and welfare of an innocent and defenceless woman in danger from your overzealous cadres and officials. I have no doubt that you are aware of the threats that were made to Ms Mwaya by some members of your party.
Be lest assured that with such threats and such public admonitions, as a Party, the Patriotic Front reserves the right to emulate you and your Party by refraining ourselves and our members from participating in any function where you are officiating.
With salutations,
Hon Given Lubinda
Vice President
Patriotic Front