Maravi

Arrest me now, Sata dares levy...insisting NCC is a national fraud
By Webster Malido and Brighton phiri
Thursday October 11, 2007 [04:00]

Patriotic Front leader Michael Sata has dared President Levy Mwanawasa to immediately arrest him because he will continue not to recognise the National Constitutional Conference (NCC), insisting it is a 'national fraud'. And Heritage Party president Brigadier General Godfrey Miyanda declared that he would not succumb to President Mwanawasa's threats.

Reacting to President Mwanawasa's threat that all those fighting the government over the NCC would be arrested and charged with treason, Sata said he would not stop criticising the NCC because it was flawed.

Addressing scores of MMD cadres and government officials at Lusaka International Airport soon after his arrival from London on Tuesday, President Mwanawasa warned that anyone daring the government over the NCC was committing treason and risked being charged with treason.

"NCC is now law. This law is now embodied, for those who did not know, in the NCC Act. I want those who are daring government to know... those who are still doubting that this is not the law and those who want to fight government and make governance impossible, that they are committing treason," President Mwanawasa warned.
"I have come back a changed person.

Let me hear no more nonsense bordering on malice, they are going to be arrested and charged with treason and bail is not available to treason."

But Sata accused President Mwanawasa of diverting the nation's attention from real issues such as the fuel shortage in the country.

"The entire leadership of the Patriotic Front is ready to be arrested. We want to see which law Levy will use from his Harding University. We don't know which law to break in the NCC," Sata said.

"Now we have proved that he doesn't mean well; he doesn't want people to get a good constitution. Tell him, we are ready to suffer on behalf of the people.

Instead of the President addressing the critical shortage of fuel and cement in the country, he has to threaten us. He doesn't own this country; this country doesn't belong to him. He doesn't need to send his trucks, we are ready to walk on our own to Chimbokaila (Lusaka Central Prison).

"The people who should be arrested for treason is the entire government for economic sabotage because they can't explain where the fuel has gone."
Sata said going by President Mwanawasa's threats, those who have decided to boycott the NCC have been vindicated.

"This NCC law, we have not seen any offence and from what changed Dr Mwanawasa is saying, we have been vindicated because there is nothing that will come up. He is hiding in this national fraud," Sata charged.

"I've packed my prison mattress, I've packed my bucket because I need to bath in prison and I've got my patapatas (flip flops) because I need all these. We are ready to go to prison if we have to achieve what the people of Zambia want and he can't imprison the whole country; he can't imprison all the Catholics, the evangelicals and the Christian Council of Zambia."

Brig Gen Miyanda said President Mwanawasa's sermon at Lusaka International Airport was an act of breach of the Constitution.

"Zambians must refuse to be cowed into silence because Zambia is a common inheritance and does not belong to one individual. It is a pity that the first message that Dr. Mwanawasa delivered to Zambians after his trip abroad was to threaten them with death penalty," Brig Gen Miyanda said.

"What has provoked the President to make such serious attack on citizens upon his arrival? As a concerned and loyal citizen, I cannot succumb to this threat because to keep quite when the President is in breach of the constitution is what must amount to treason."
Brig. Gen. Miyanda asked Zambians to seriously begin to inquire what happened to the good people whenever they got into State House.

"What has happened to our Mr. Chibumba (concrete wall)? President Mwanawasa was a pillar of the 1991 mini-revolution when we succeeded in compelling the UNIP regime in reverting to multiparty system of government," he said.

"Even as a layman myself, I am convinced that Dr. Mwanawasa's declaration at the airport is not law in Zambia. May be in America where they honour people who do such things."

Brig. Gen. Miyanda said it was wrong for President Mwanawasa to threaten that it was illegal for anyone to criticise the law.

"What is this law that he decreed that you cannot criticise the law? If this were so, we would not have managed to change Article 4 of the one party constitution. Why are amendments provided for in our current laws?" he asked. "What is the NCC Act trying to achieve? Is it not to change the existing laws of the land? How then does Dr. Mwanawasa arrive at the airport and deliberately mislead his cadres that it is an offence to comment on the existing laws?"
Brig Gen Miyanda said it was President Mwanawasa's type of conduct that was contributing towards the creation of the mistrust and polarising further the already tense situation in the country.

"If Zambians are in doubt about our concerns about the NCC that it will take place under the cloud of fear and intimidation, now they have the direct evidence from the doctor of laws himself," he said.

"So is Dr Mwanawasa saying that those suggesting changes to the present Constitution at the NCC will be guilty of treason?"

He said under the country's current laws, treason was punishable by mandatory death sentence and that the courts of law had no choice, once they found the accused guilty of treason, except to enforce the death sentence.

"Yet Dr Mwanawasa has amended the Constitution by publicly declaring that he will never consent to the death sentence as long as he was President. If he is so strong against the death sentence, why is he rushing to threaten people with this offence whose sentence is death?" Brig Gen Miyanda asked.

He said Zambians could excuse the first Republican president Dr Kenneth Kaunda and Frederick Chiluba, who were not lawyers, for any mistake they made regarding the law, but not President Mwanawasa, who was not only a lawyer, but had a honourary degree bestowed on him for the perceived accomplishments in the developmnent of the law in the country.

"What kind of law development is this that is based on threats all the time?" he asked. "What kind of example is this for the youth to whom Dr Mwanawasa has dedicated his honourary degree?"

He said it was clear that President Mwanawasa knew what he was saying was wrong and unconstitutional.

"But he has chosen to threaten Zambians in order to ensure that delegates to the NCC are clear in their mind that there will be trouble for them if they do not agree with him. I was so encouraged by the accolades by the University in America that last week I wrote to the President, congratulating and asking him to agree to meet those who were questioning the NCC Act. Judging by his statement, my letter which was delivered to State House last week, will be used as evidence of treason," Brig Gen Miyanda said.

"But my little consolation is that I am aware of one famous and world re-known politician who was found guilty and convicted of treason. This man today is the darling of the world in spite of the treason charges...the man is Dr Nelson Mandela. It would not be a bad idea to take a leaf from this great man of Africa. When Dr Mwanawasa is no longer in office as it is likely to happen, unless the Constitution is changed to allow his third term, Dr Mwanawasa may just turn round and find that one of the people he had arrested and charged with treason, has just saved him from some problem."

Labels: MWANAWASA, NCC, SATA

posted by MrK @ 7:09 AM