Tembo Blames Family Lawyer’s Admission for Government Victory in Lungu Burial Case
Opposition leader and Patriots for Economic Progress (PeP) president Sean E. Tembo has attributed the government’s victory in the controversial Edgar Lungu burial case to what he describes as a “critical blunder” by the late president’s family lawyer during the court proceedings in South Africa.
Tembo, who also serves as spokesperson for the opposition Tonse Alliance, published a detailed analysis on Thursday morning explaining how the South African court ruled in favour of the Zambian government after initially appearing to lean toward the Lungu family’s wishes.
“It soon became apparent to me that ECL’s family clearly had an upper hand, for the simple reason that South African law gave the next of kin the right to determine where and how a dead person should be interred,” Tembo wrote.
The Zambian government had obtained an interim injunction to stop the burial of former President Lungu, which had been scheduled for June 26, 2025, in South Africa. It argued that the burial should take place in Zambia, citing public interest.
Tembo acknowledged that the government’s public interest argument was weak and lacked credible evidence, such as statistically sound surveys or widespread national consensus.
“You literally have to undertake a statistically sound survey where it is determined that the majority of Zambians want ECL to be buried in Zambia,” he explained. “Government tried to demonstrate public interest by… engaging proxies to undertake protests in front of the Gauteng High Court in Pretoria. But these efforts fell far short.”
However, according to Tembo, the tide turned during the August 4 hearing when the judge asked the Lungu family’s lawyer whether it was in the public interest that the former president be buried in Zambia.
“The ECL family lawyer answered in the affirmative, but quickly qualified his answer by saying, ‘… it is however the desire of the family that he should be buried here in South Africa,’” Tembo revealed.
That single admission, Tembo claims, effectively handed the government the legal victory it had struggled to secure.
“At that moment, I sunk in my seat with helplessness. The moment the lawyer agreed that it was in the public interest that ECL should be buried in Zambia, I knew that we had lost the case,” he said.
Tembo further questioned whether the lawyer’s apparent misstep was due to incompetence or possible compromise.
“The question that shall remain lingering on the back of my mind is whether that was due to plain incompetence or he was compromised?” he asked.
©️ KUMWESU | August 8, 2025