PRESIDENT HICHILEMA MUST STOP COMMENTING ON CRIMINAL INVESTIGATIONS
19.07.2023
President Hakainde Hichilema is not a competent authority to comment on matters under criminal investigations as doing so amounts to political interference and exerting unnecessary pressure on law enforcement agencies.
In his remarks, the President concluded that those arrested are criminals because, in his view, they have committed a crime and yet the constitution deems everyone innocent until proven otherwise by, not just any court of law, but a competent court of law.
The President must restrict himself to his job description, namely, to provide leadership so that constitutional office bearers carry out their functions.
His press conference was a sad confirmation of a President who does not have a proper conceptualization of the lines that demarcate the boundaries of his office.
While he claimed, at the beginning of his press briefing, that he was going to talk about the rule of law, he dwelt, at considerable length, on an active criminal investigation, whose outcome lies in the hands of another public institution set up by the Zambian constitution – the courts of law.
He spoke in a triumphant tone as though he was a court of law and had found the suspects guilty. It was as though being guilty should be the only outcome and yet the criminal justice system is about affording the accused a fair hearing.
On several occasions during the press briefing, he contradicted himself when, in one breath, he claimed he was not interfering in criminal investigations, and yet in another, he said people will be shocked by the evidence that will come out. Herein lies a serious problem: he has already concluded that there is a smoking gun.
The questions we ask him are: what competence do you have to decide what constitutes a smoking gun? Do you know that by making such remarks you are exerting pressure on the criminal justice system to bend the wheels of justice your way?
We know how desperately President Hichilema wants to be vindicated for his incessant accusations of corruption against the former ruling party, but we urge him to take a step back and allow the institutions of the state to play their legally defined functions.
The criminal justice system is informed by its own professional and ethical standards against which evidence gathered by law enforcement agencies is weighed.
Many are the times when overzealous politicians like President Hichilema have been embarrassed and forced to eat a humble pie when a court ruling has gone against their way.
Zambians cannot be hoodwinked by what President Hichilema is desperately projecting as the realization of his electoral promises.
Zambians had hoped for economic growth, job creation, lower lending rates, and lower cost of living as these constitute the basis upon which they gave him their vote.
Having failed lamentably on this front, he has become fixated with a matter that masks his failures and his personal agenda against his perceived enemies.
No, we wish to remind the President to remain in his lane where we want him to be so that we can see him clearly and remind him that he is not driving this nation as a competent driver ought to.
He therefore needs to park and learn from his instructors, the Zambian people.
ISSUED BY: HON. GIVEN LUBINDA
ACTING PRESIDENT
PATRIOTIC FRONT