By NAMO PHIRI
“We want to raise the red card to the UPND government and the police that there is no more room for continued abuse of people’s rights because this country is a multi-party democracy,” New Heritage Party president Chishala Kateka has said
Ms Kateka has cautioned that the police command through the Inspector General of Police Lemmy Kajoba needed to wake up and understand that the days of impunity and abuse of the law were over.
Commenting on the recent disruption of the opposition member’s protest, Ms Kateka said the police broke the law in the manner they conducted themselves.
She said the New Heritage Party would not take lightly any aggravation against themselves or any other Zambian because they were aware that there were a lot of Zambians languishing in police cells, prisons and remand facilities throughout the country because of their low status in society and ignorance of their rights.
Ms Kateka said Zambia was a constitutional republic and that any law or action by any entity, state or otherwise not in keeping with the Constitution was not only unlawful but was null and void in the face of the law.
“Our protest was made in keeping with the constitutional provisions and also in line with the requirements of the public order act as was ruled upon by the Honorable Supreme Court in the case of Mulundika and seven others” said Ms Kateka
Ms Kateka said it was unfortunate that the police who are supposed to be there to protect the rights of law abiding citizens which the protesters were chose to go against the constitutional provisions and proceeded to break the law by preventing the protesters from presenting the petition to the correct office.
“Earlier this year we warned about Zambia sleep walking into a dictatorship and the signs are some of the ones we are talking about of the creation of a police state but we refuse to be cowards, we would like to advise the UPND government not to use the police for purposes of suppressing the citizens and narrowing the space for their political opponents simply because of their waning political fortunes brought about by their own political in capabilities and incompetence especially for having failed to fulfill their campaign promises,” Ms Kateka said.
