Saboi kisses freedom goodbye!
A SMILEY Saboi Imboela distributed flying kisses to journalists and the public as she boarded the infamous Kasalanga Truck enroute to prison yesterday.
The former musician will spend the next seven days in incarceration following her arrest last Friday on bench warrant.
Without appointment or sort of application, Saboi who has retained the services of Makebi Zulu Advocates appeared at the Lusaka Magistrates Court yesterday hoping to get principal resident magistrate Sylvia Munyinya to quash the bench warrant.
Things could however not go out as planned, as magistrate Munyinya was not ready for Saboi and declined to attend to her on reasons that her case was not cause listed for August 12 but August 20.
Last week Wednesday, magistrate Munyinya issued a bench warrant against Saboi for absconding Court in a matter where she is Che with libel.
Saboi is accused of defaming State House chief communications specialist Clayson Hamasaka when she alleged that he had engaged in corruption dealings with Chinese nationals and that he was a ladies man whose marriage was on rocks and was at the verge of being divorced by his wife for being promiscuous.
When the case was called for return of bench warrant by prosecutor Ngenda, magistrate Munyinya wondered why Saboi was appearing before her yesterday without an appointment.
“I don’t have the case record before me, can we follow procedure! As far as I am concerned the matter is coming on the 20th and not today. The matter has been causelisted for that date, the record will be brought when the matter will come before me,” she said.
Without making an application for an abridgment of time so that his client could be attended to, Saboi’s lawyer Emmanuel Phiri rose to explain why the singer missed Court.
“We have this urgent issue, when the matter came up she wasn’t feeling too well she rushed to the clinic,” Phiri said.
The conduct by Phiri upset magistrate Munyinya who interjected before he could finish explaining, to scold him for flouting procedural rules.
“You want to give evidence from the bar as counsel? You want to take oath? An explanation has to be given on oath by the accused, I only attend to matters that are causelisted,” she said.
She was incensed with Phiri’s audacity to address her without filing a formal application for abridgment of time.
“There’s no application to bridge the date how are you addressing me! You need to make an application for an abridgment of time and I have to allow it and give a date for you to address me and then the registry will pull the record on that date,” said magistrate Munyinya.
“Do what the law requires you to do, let’s follow procedure. You are coming here to do what? to make an application off record! so that I can make an order off record? It doesn’t work like that I will not allow it can we follow procedure. Let the matter come on the 20th.”
After the session, members of the UKA group had their faces dropped, upon learning that their outspoken comrade will remain spend at least a week behind bars.
The members congested the holding cells to bid hello to Saboi for 10 minutes, before they could leave to offer solidarity to Socialist party leader Dr Fred M’membe at Ibex Hill police station.
As she was boarding the prison truck locally known as Kasalanga, Saboi embraced confinement with a smile and kisses in the air a mask properly worn for the cameras.
The signer waved goodbye to the journalists who were filming her through a tiny window.
By Mwaka Ndawa
Kalemba August 13, 2024.