By Given Mutinta

THERE IS UNDECLARED ‘WAR’ AGAINST THE CATHOLIC CHURCH SAYS FR MWEWA

A Chingola-based Catholic priest, Fr. Augustine Mwewa, has urged Catholics in Zambia to safeguard their voters’ cards in preparation for the upcoming general elections, encouraging them to use their votes as a form of protest against the recent summoning of Archbishop Alick Banda by the Drug Enforcement Commission (DEC).

Fr. Mwewa, who serves as the president of the Local Catholic Clergy in Zambia, expressed that the action against the Archbishop represents a hostile move by the UPND administration, which he accused of ‘declaring war’ on Catholics.

He criticized the government’s tactics, which he referred to as ‘mingalato’, aimed at suppressing dissenting voices.

Fr. Mwewa emphasized that Catholics should not succumb to intimidation and lamented the government’s stance, stating, “It is a pity the government has chosen to declare war against the Catholic Church,” asserting that the current administration’s performance deserves a mere one out of ten since taking office in 2021.

He remarked that the government’s failure to accept divergent opinions stems from its lackluster performance, countering its claims of success.

Furthermore, he cautioned that the government might resort to using cyber laws against Christians, yet urged them to remain steadfast in their beliefs and actions, underscoring the importance of voicing their grievances through the electoral process.

Kalaba stands with Bishop Banda over dubious Hilux gift

OPPOSITION Citizens First (CF) president Harry Kalaba who has strong roots in the PF says his party will stand in solidarity with anti-government Lusaka Diocese Archbishop Alick Banda.

The opposition clergyman is due to appear for interrogations before the Drug Enforcement Commission on Monday over a Toyota Hilux he dubiously received from the  fallen PF while in power.

Although DEC grabbed the Hilux from Bishop Banda back in 2023, the commission announced yesterday that they had few  questions for him on Monday.

The commission urged the Bishop not to create drama and report to headquarters alone.

But Kalaba who feels the Bishop needs company come Monday.

Despite having no parliamentary or local government representation, Kalaba who emerged third in the 2021 elections with slightly over 24,000 votes announced that; “The CF stands with ArchBishop Alick Banda and the Catholic Church and will escort His Grace to the DEC on Monday”.

Besides Kalaba, Socialist Party leader Dr Fred M’membe has also indicated that he will walk with Bishop Banda on Monday and has since urged Catholics and Zambians  of good will to do the same.

Kalemba January 2, 2026

WHY IS PRESIDENT HAKAINDE HICHILEMA GOING AFTER ARCHBISHOP ALICK BANDA?

By Brian Matambo | Lusaka, Zambia

In a nation that proclaims itself Christian, there are moments when law, power, and conscience collide so loudly that silence becomes impossible. Zambia is standing in such a moment.

The summoning of Lusaka Archbishop Dr. Alick Banda by the Drug Enforcement Commission has triggered questions that no procedural statement can dismiss. The issue is no longer whether the State has the legal authority to summon a citizen. It is whether the State understands the moral, historical, and political weight of the citizen it has chosen to summon, and the moment it has chosen to do so.

The question Zambians are now asking is simple, unsettling, and unavoidable. Why Archbishop Alick Banda?

Is it because he officiated at the funeral service of late former President Edgar Chagwa Lungu, offering dignity where the State had offered hostility? Is it because the Lungu family, in their moment of deepest grief, chose Archbishop Banda as their representative in mediation talks, while government appointed Bishop Joshua Banda to sit on the opposite side? Is it because Archbishop Banda has emerged, quietly but firmly, as a voice of reason in a season where reason itself has become inconvenient?

Or is it because this regime finds moral clarity acutely discomforting?

The State insists the matter is purely legal. That a motor vehicle once belonging to the Zambia Revenue Authority found its way to the Archbishop, and that questions must therefore be asked. Yet even within the factual record now circulating publicly, the narrative is far less sensational than the accusations suggest. Investigations into the disposal of ZRA vehicles were conducted by a Joint Investigations Team comprising multiple agencies. That process resulted in the arrest and prosecution of two former ZRA officials, Kingsley Chanda and Callistus Kaoma, for failure to follow procedure in the disposal of 22 vehicles.

What is conspicuously absent from the court record is any finding that Archbishop Alick Banda stole, solicited, or unlawfully acquired a motor vehicle. Evidence presented in court shows that when the Archbishop learned that the Toyota Hilux associated with him was under investigation, he surrendered it voluntarily to the Joint Investigations Team. The vehicle was not recovered from him.

It was handed over by him. It was later produced in court as an exhibit in the case against the ZRA officials. No charge was laid against the Archbishop. No offence was attributed to him. If there had been evidence of criminality, the prosecution would have had every opportunity to add his name to the charge sheet. It did not.

This is why the current summons feels less like due process and more like insistence. As if the State is determined to extract something that has already been examined, testified to, and judicially concluded. As if explanation itself is now the offence.

Context matters. History matters. Memory matters.

Not long ago, a senior official of the ruling party publicly labelled Archbishop Banda “the Lucifer of Zambia”. It was a statement so incendiary, so reckless, that it should have attracted immediate condemnation and discipline from the highest office in the land. Instead, the response was silence. Worse still, the silence felt like approval. When private citizens attempted to pursue legal redress for hate speech and criminal defamation, the process was swiftly halted. The insult stood. The wound festered.

Zambians did not forget.

They also did not forget that when civil society and the Oasis Forum sought to oppose the controversial Bill 7, the Catholic Church was deliberately isolated and vilified, its clergy paraded as political villains, its bishops reduced to unnamed enemies of the State. Ministers were deployed to disparage the Church. It felt, to many observers, like a forced ultimatum. Choose the President, or choose your faith.

Now add to this a record that troubles the conscience of the nation. A government that sued a widow on the very day she was meant to bury her husband, because the President insisted that he alone should preside over the burial of his political nemesis. A government whose leader once dismissed the National Day of Prayer and Reconciliation as irrelevant, while his own ministers derided it as a gathering of wilful sinners. A government that has held the former first family in mourning for seven months, not out of necessity, but out of ego and control.

These are not the actions of humility. They are the habits of power unrestrained by reverence.

It is therefore deeply ironic that those who defend this posture dare to accuse a Catholic Archbishop of Luciferian tendencies. If the term has any meaning at all, it describes pride that exalts itself above all else. It describes power that refuses accountability. It describes authority that weaponises institutions to silence moral resistance.

In Christian theology, those who suffer for speaking truth do not wear the mark of evil. They carry the cost of the Gospel.

Archbishop Alick Banda has not called for insurrection. He has not mobilised violence. He has not abused office. He has spoken, presided, mediated, and prayed. If that makes him a threat, then the problem is not the Bishop. It is the State.

Zambia’s democracy was never meant to be a courtroom without conscience. It was meant to be a covenant between law, reason, and faith. When any one of these is crushed under the weight of ego, the nation begins to fracture.

This moment demands restraint. It demands wisdom. It demands that power remember it is temporary, while faith endures.

A Christian nation is not measured by how loudly leaders invoke God at commemorations, but by how carefully they treat His servants when those servants become inconvenient.

Zambia must choose reason over vendetta, democracy over intimidation, and faith over fear.

SEVEN MONTHS OF AN OPEN GRAVE : A NATION IN SPIRITUAL LIMBO

By Thandiwe Ketiš Ngoma

It has been nearly seven months since Zambia lost its sixth Republican President, Edgar Chagwa Lungu. Upon hearing of his passing, the incumbent President, Hakainde Hichilema, reportedly instructed that a grave for his predecessor be dug before even consulting the family on the burial arrangements.

When the Lungu family communicated the deceased’s wishes, that he did not want his predecessor to preside over his funeral or be near his remains, President Hichilema refused to respect them. Instead, he insisted that he would preside over the funeral.

Faced with the impossibility of honoring their loved one’s wishes, the family decided to bury Edgar Chagwa Lungu in South Africa, where he had sought specialized medical treatment and later died.

In response, President Hichilema reportedly sued the grieving family in a South African court. Nearly seven months later, the case remains unresolved, leaving the nation with what can only be described as an open grave, a spiritual and moral concern that extends far beyond politics.

THE SPIRITUAL MEANING OF AN OPEN GRAVE FOR A NATION

The symbolism of an open grave has profound implications for any country. Drawing from Biblical theology and African traditional spirituality, an open grave is not superstition. It is a reflection of unresolved moral and spiritual disorder.

I. Biblical and Christian Perspective

In Scripture, a grave is not merely a burial place. It represents justice, memory, and closure. When a grave remains open, it is a spiritual warning.

An Open Grave Represents Unrepented Sin

“Their throat is an open grave; with their tongues they speak deceit.” (Psalm 5:9, Romans 3:13) For a nation, this means leaders may speak righteousness while practicing injustice, institutions may appear lawful but conceal cruelty, and truth may be buried while lies remain exposed. An open grave spiritually signals sin that has not been confessed or corrected, especially by those in authority.

It Symbolizes Blood Crying from the Ground

Genesis recounts, “The voice of your brother’s blood cries to me from the ground.” This applies beyond physical killing to oppression, denial of dignity, and deliberate harm. Unresolved injustice causes unrest, instability, and national disquiet.

Leaders Who Dig Graves Fall Into Them

“Whoever digs a pit will fall into it.” (Proverbs 26:27) Power used to suppress others eventually backfires, manifesting as loss of moral authority, political reversals, or leadership collapse.

An Open Grave Blocks National Blessing

“When you spread out your hands in prayer, I hide my eyes from you.” (Isaiah 1:15) Without justice, even effort and prayer fail to produce prosperity. Economic stagnation, citizen despair, and repeated crises are often the spiritual reflection of unresolved moral debts.

II. African Traditional Spirituality Perspective

In African cosmology, graves are gateways between the living, the dead, and the unborn. Leaving a grave open disrupts national balance and invites misfortune.

An Open Grave Means Disturbed Balance

The ancestors are unsettled, the land becomes restless, leadership loses legitimacy, and misfortune repeats across generations. An unjust or dishonored death pollutes the land until it is addressed.

It Invites Reversal of Power

“The ground you open for another remembers your footsteps.” Leaders who humiliate or deny mercy to others invite humiliation and instability upon themselves. Authority gained without compassion is fragile.

An Open Grave Is a Debt, Not a Curse

This is moral, not magical. Until the debt is acknowledged and paid through truth, reconciliation, and restoration of dignity, consequences manifest socially, politically, and spiritually.

III. The Spiritual Remedy for a Nation

Both Biblical and African traditions point to the same solution. Closure requires moral courage.

Truth Before Healing – The nation must honestly confront wrongdoing.
Justice Tempered With Mercy – Laws and authority should protect, not oppress.
Restoration of Dignity – Even rivals or opponents deserve humane treatment.
Public Humility by Leadership – Healing begins when leaders admit excesses and respect national conscience.

FINAL WARNING AND HOPE

An open grave is not fate. It is a warning. It signals that injustice cannot be buried quietly. It invites the nation to restore moral and spiritual balance through humility, truth, and reconciliation.

History, Scripture, and African wisdom converge on this principle:

The earth does not forget how it was disturbed. And the grave dug for another always remembers its digger.

For Zambia, seven months of an open grave is more than a delay in burial. It is a reflection of unresolved leadership decisions, unhealed national wounds, and spiritual unrest. Until moral order is restored, the open grave continues to cast a shadow over the nation.

WEST PROVINCIAL CHAIRMAN MBANGWETA CELEBRATES BY-ELECTION VICTORIES IN LIANGATI, LITAWA, AND MUTONDO WARDS

As the Provincial Chairman, along with my Team at the UPND Secretariat in Western Province, extend our heartfelt gratitude to the residents of Liangati Ward in Senanga Constituency, as well as Litawa and Mutondo Wards respectively in Nalikwanda Constituency, for their support of UPND candidates in the recently concluded by-elections held on 31st December 2025, which were necessitated by the unfortunate passing away  of our sitting Councillors.

These victories serve as a reflection and endorsement of President Hakainde Hichilema’s people-centered leadership, which prioritizes the welfare of our citizens. They also reflect the continuity of support and appreciation for the newly enacted Bill 7, a people driven constitution making process that was misrepresented by some of the President’s usual critics, who sought to mislead the public with false claims regarding the extension of the President’s tenure of office, the removal of the running mate clause, and the 50% +1 voting requirement when in fact not.

In view of the foregoing, i urge the people of Western Province to continue their support and solidarity with President Hichilema, who has demonstrated a tacit commitment to our communities through unprecedented development spread out across all districts—an achievement that starkly contrasts the previous administrations.

Issued by:

Hon Kapelwa Mbangweta 
WEST UPND PROVINCIAL CHAIRMAN/MINISTER