By KENNEDY LIMWANYA –
Exactly five years ago, on April 11, 2017, opposition United Party for National Development (UPND) leader Hakainde Hichilema was arrested for allegedly plotting to overthrow the Zambian government.
That was hours after heavily armed and masked policemen had raided Mr Hichilema’s home in Lusaka’s New Kasama residential area, leaving a trail of destruction and defecating in the mansion.
Prior to the raid, ruling Patriotic Front (PF) deputy secretary general Mumbi Phiri had issued a veiled instruction to Inspector General of Police Kakoma Kanganja to arrest Mr Hichilema.
At that time, it was common for PF officials to give orders to the Zambia Police about whom to and not to arrest.
Lawlessness had become the order of the day.
There was no equality before the law.
That was the reason why what may have passed for a traffic offence, with Mr Hichilema’s driver being the offender, was manufactured into treason whose maximum penalty is a death sentence.
Mr Hichilema’s outrageous charge of treason had come on the back of a case of road rage in Mongu, Western Province, when the Zambian opposition leader’s convoy failed to give way to President Edgar Lungu’s motorcade as the two political rivals headed to Limulunga for
the Kuomboka Ceremony.
It was the first time ever that the Zambian people witnessed a presidential motorcade overtaking other motorists.
There had been no route lining by the Zambia police because Mr Lungu had been scheduled to fly by chopper from Lealui to Mongu.
What made him change his mind and decide to follow Mr Hichilema’s convoy can only be best answered by him.
An arrest had been looming way before the Mongu debacle.
What an opportunity the Mongu road rage presented for Mr Hichilema to be charged with a capital offence punishable by hanging until pronounced dead by a certified medical doctor!
Previously, whenever the police wanted Mr Hichilema for questioning, they had presented him with call-outs and he had, obediently, reported himself before the law enforcement agencies.
He had done so on 14 times that he had been arrested before April 11, 2017.
Whatever motivated Inspector General of Police Kakoma Kanganja to order his heavily-armed and masked policemen to conduct a night raid on a harmless Mr Hichilema is difficult to understand.
Apart from that, why did they mask themselves?
Further, why did they cut off electricity supply to Mr Hichilema’s house?
Why did they not want to be identified?
Why did they torture Mr Hichilema’s workers?
What are the names of the officers who were on that operation?
What was the motive of discharging tear smoke in a dwelling place of law abiding citizens among whom was Mrs Mutinta Hichilema, who is an asthmatic patient?
These are the questions that need to be answered to bring that brutal raid to finality.
As if that brutality were not enough, the charge of treason which was slapped on Mr Hichilema at Woodlands Police Station was equally brutal, leading a female police officer to exclaim in disbelief.
The manner in which Mr Hichilema was driven to Lilayi Police Training College for incarceration was as though he were a criminal.
This only happens in dictatorial regimes.
That was the reason why, a few days later, Archbishop Telesphore Mpundu, writing on behalf of the Zambia Council of Catholic Bishops, accused Mr Lungu’s government of being high-handed.
As if it were a joke, Mr Hichilema and his five co-accused would spend 127 days languishing in prison.
The five co-accused were Hamusonde Hamaleka, Muleya Hachinda, Laston Mulilanduba, Pretorious Haloba and Wallace Chakawa.
Together, they endured prison life at Lilayi Police Training College, Lusaka Central Prison and Mukobeko Maximum Security Prison in Kabwe.
The indictment had stated that Mr Hichilema had plotted “to unseat the Zambian government between April 5 and 8, 2017, by mobilising his supporters for the Kuomboka ceremony in Mongu to give him the status of Zambian president.”
It was only after the intervention of Commonwealth Secretary General Patricia Scotland that Mr Hichilema was released on August 16, 2017, when the National Prosecutions Authority entered a nolle prosequei on the day trial was set to commence.
One fundamental question that begs imagination is: had Mr Hichilema not hidden in a bunker on the night the police raided his home, what could have happened?
Most probably, he could have been history and the State would have feigned ignorance.
This is the reason why former President Lungu needs to tread carefully and not begin to insinuate that his successor is being hypocritical.
Compared to the way the late former President Rupiah Banda was treated by the PF government following his defeat in 2011, Mr Lungu has been handled with almost surprising dignity.
Mr Banda was verbally attacked by the presidency, senior government officials and ordinary PF cadres.
His wife, Thandiwe, was summoned for interrogations at Zambia Police in less than five months of losing power.
On foreign trips, Zambian missions refused to extend to Mr Banda diplomatic courtesies due to a former head of State.
He could not be received by officials from the Zambian missions and it was the host countries which were providing vehicles for his use while there.
Twice, he was stopped from flying out of Kenneth Kaunda International Airport.
Later, he had his passport withdrawn and immunity lifted for him to face prosecution.
All things being equal, the experience Mr Banda went through before 2015 should never be wished on a former Zambian president.
The PF only warmed up to Mr Banda when he helped Mr Lungu win the 2015 and 2016 presidential elections.
Therefore, to have Mr Lungu accuse Mr Hichilema of being a hypocrite is, surely, an open exhibition of ingratitude, more so expressing such views during former President Banda’s burial on March 18, 2022.
When making the accusations of hypocrisy, Mr Lungu did not mention Mr Hichilema by name but it was very easy to tell whom he was referring to.
Mr Lungu did not specify what he meant by the alleged acts of hypocrisy.
The former President could have meant the questioning of leaders under his government; or questioning related to alleged acts of corruption; money laundering and proceeds of crime.
Do the Zambian people not deserve justice?
When making the accusations of hypocrisy, Mr Lungu also mentioned the need for “genuine dialogue” between the ruling party and the opposition.
He did not, however, mention the subjects of contention.
In the same vein, what is also expected from Mr Lungu is a genuine apology from him for Mr Hichilema’s malicious arrest on April 11, 2017, and eventual incarceration.
That is the only way there can be healing.
Mr Lungu may have apologised that day former President Banda brought him and President-elect Hichilema together after the August 12, 2021 elections.
But, five years after April 11, 2017, many questions remain unanswered.