Maravi

Chongwe explains his compensation

Chongwe explains his compensation
By George Chellah
Tue 08 Dec. 2009, 04:01 CAT

LUSAKA lawyer Dr Rodger Chongwe has justified his compensation claim, saying he is happy that the government is going to implement the decision and that President Rupiah Banda played a part in the matter.

But home affairs minister Lameck Mangani has denied that President Banda authorised the payment of US $5.9 million to Dr Chongwe as compensation.

Commenting on revelations by The Post that President Banda has instructed that he should be paid US $5.9million as compensation arising from injuries he suffered during the 1997 police shooting in Kabwe, Dr Chongwe explained in a statement dated December 5, 2009 that he was entitled to the compensation.

And in an apparent reference to the compensation amount, Dr Chongwe said he expected his compensation to accrue interest since the government refused to pay his entitlement for over nine years.
He said The Post had a long history of largely thoughtful engagement with reporting the Kabwe shooting and its consequences.

“I was shot under the auspices of the same President who is now being quoted by Mr Sata in The Post as saying that the government was not given a chance to defend itself and the decision against it was made in a foreign country. This is the Chiluba who danced at the airport when he heard I was shot and others injured. Read the Post archives. It is a lie that the United Nations did not allow the Zambian government to defend itself and it is wrong to propagate this lie.

The Government of Zambia had people within it who had no qualms about libeling the sixteen International Jurists at the UN who sat to hear this complaint. Since when has the United Nations been a foreign country? The article refers to me as a Lusaka lawyer. This is correct today and it says that I was at the time of the shooting the leader of the Liberal Progressive Front - true as far as it goes,” Dr Chongwe stated. “More relevant to this article, I was also the chair of an Alliance of 13 Opposition Political Parties that was a serious thorn in the side of the MMD under Mr. Chiluba.

At the tail end of the article, I note the economical description of what happened to me in Kabwe. The Post previously published a much fuller account from Dr Brian Chituwo, who is a government minister today as he was under Mwanawasa, but at the time was in charge of the Kabwe General Hospital and contributed in no small measure to saving my life. The source at the Ministry of Finance says Mr. Mwanawasa offered me a sum of sixty thousand dollars for the shooting in Kabwe and I refused it but Mr Mwanawasa was given lock, stock and barrel to the Zambian people by Mr Chiluba and it is not surprising that he adopted the lies of Mr Chiluba and his minions about what happened in Kabwe and the way the United Nations conducted its hearing about this event.
“However, even under Mr. Mwanawasa these particular lies from the Chiluba era were gradually dismantled and it is a fact that during his time, the government of Zambia acknowledged to me in writing that not only had the United Nations Human Rights Committee found in my favour but also that our government was obliged to implement its decision. In the same breath, however, it said that the government would decide the amount of damages for itself, a position, which I also rejected. It is pertinent to note that the article reports that the source says Mr Mwanawasa offered me a particular sum of money. This statement in itself indicates that it was in order for Mr Mwanawasa as President to decide to do so.”

Dr Chongwe stated that it had never been the case even under the Zambian law that an entity that had not bothered to defend itself against a claim where the amount of damages claimed was stated (as it was before the United Nations Human Rights Committee) could arbitrarily decide what it will pay when the matter was decided against it.

“Some of the readers will realise that Mr Chiluba even in the case properly brought by the Zambian Government against him in London refused to appear to defend himself here when given the opportunity. The Post published my open advice to him to do so. The repetition of Mr Sata's statement in the article appears to be made to give the impression that that I am a tribalist. This can be interpreted as an attempt to simply slur me. If there are those who know me and who have worked with me who say it is so, let them be found by the writer of the article and bring their reasoned evidence to the public view. I believe that for every one, there will be another who will defend me. Actually I would be very surprised to hear that Mr Sata really thinks that I am a tribalist whatever his off the cuff utterances,” Dr Chongwe stated.

“It is a fact that Mr. Sata stated at a press conference in March 2003 soon after my return to Zambia from exile in Australia that as a result of the Findings of the United Nations Human Rights Committee in October 2000 the Zambian Government should pay the damages resulting from the Kabwe shooting. The Post will find this in its archives. Since I returned from exile Mr Sata, who when he was still in Chiluba's Government had not always been quite accurate in his description of what occurred in Kabwe, has supported my rights except when he is annoyed with me.”

Dr Chongwe stated Mwanawasa on the other hand made apologies to other victims of human rights violations but pointedly excluded him from these apologies.

“Yet, of those still alive I probably sustained the greatest violence just as I endured numerous expulsive acts by agents of the Zambian State. This led to the current Attorney General of Zambia, then in the position of Chairman of the Zambian Human Rights Commission welcoming the apologies but asking why the same was not being offered to Dr Rodger Chongwe which statement was also reported in the Post Newspaper. In fact Mr Mwanawasa never saw fit to meet with me on my return from exile. Although he made appointments to meet me, he broke them on each occasion. This was so although I had been his teacher, been Chair of LAZ when he was its Vice Chair as well as being the person he asked to recommend him for the honour and dignity of State Counsel, something which he set great store in,” Dr Chongwe stated.

“I had also been a Minister serving together with him in Cabinet when he was Vice President of Zambia. It was to me he turned to assist him by talking to President Chiluba to assign duties to him as Vice President. Unfortunately, President Chiluba refused to do so and reminded me that the Constitution stated that he, as President, assigns the nature of work to the Vice President. Possibly Mr. Mwanawasa thought it was arrogant of me to wish to meet with him in 2003 or if I were to be churlish I would say it was because I was not his tribesman or his relative or in business with him or his family members.”

Dr Chongwe said in President Banda's case, even though he did indeed support his candidature in 2008, it took over one year after his election for the President to give him an appointment.

“Mr. Rupiah Banda may not be a great President by the lights of The Post. However, he has personal knowledge of and is otherwise aware of numerous acts directed towards me including attempted assassination that led to my exile for over five years from Zambia. I wanted to meet him and under these circumstances some would feel he was duty bound to meet me.”

Dr Chongwe said the public could safely assume that President Banda had also been briefed by the Attorney General on follow-up complaints before the United Nations and any embarrassment in international fora this might have caused.

“It is actually probably because of this that he did not make any time to meet me after his election, as he was fully aware of the obligations of the State towards me. However he did agree eventually to meet me,” Dr Chongwe stated. “Therefore, as far as your article is concerned, it is quite true that President Banda met me to discuss this matter a year after his election. He did not deviate from the eventual decision of the Mwanawasa regime that the Zambian government recognised the findings of the UNHRC except that he agreed that it must implement it; including the damages in the claim. He also accepted that the government had failed to do this since 2000 and that according to the law of Zambia it was liable to pay interest.

The President, like The Post, has been in business and is aware that you don't get to use someone's money for free for nine years. During the meeting, the President also recalled some of the events that occurred in the period prior to my being shot and those leading to my exile. For the record and before it comes up, he did not ask me to support his future political aspirations or to adjust my political views in any way in response to the settlement of this matter. He also did not offer me a job or position of any kind. He did not seek my advice on other matters either.

“The President told me that he is not a lawyer and would leave the other issues regarding costs and loss of earnings resulting from my exile with the Minister of Justice/Vice President. During the meeting he asked me to see the Minister of Justice/Vice President and he called him. In my presence, he informed the Minister that the Government would be implementing the decision as described above. Whilst on the phone to the Vice President/Minister of Justice, President Banda outlined the basis for his decision as being that the Zambian Government has a responsibility to honour the decisions of the tribunals that administer the treaties to which Zambia has signed up. He asked the Minister of Justice/Vice President to meet with me and Mr. George Kunda agreed to do so. The following day, the other matters were discussed with the Vice President who in my presence also spoke to the Attorney General of Zambia who I later met.”

Dr Chongwe stated that the Attorney General told him that he was pleased to be able to satisfactorily finalise this long outstanding matter.

“Later as I was leaving the country immediately after this, I left my bank details with the Secretary to the Treasury letting him know that he could expect a letter confirming the facts from the Attorney General. As far as I am aware there is nothing sinister in this sequence of events,” Dr Chongwe stated. “Perhaps it is meaningless information to some, but two weeks ago our Minister of Finance told the National Assembly that the Zambian Reserves have never been as healthy in 38 years of the country's independence as they are today.

He said they had reached USD 1.7 billion. It was reported in the public media. When I returned from Australia in 2003, I met with several senior Zambians including the late Mr. E. Kasonde, then a Minister of Finance. He informed me that there had been a government decision to pay the damages owed to me. However when it came down to it he was still waiting for the letter from Mr Mwanawasa to go ahead and for some reason he had not yet sent it.

“I also met Mr Newstead Zimba who was then Minister of Information. He confirmed what Minister Kasonde told me. Minister Zimba actually telephoned Mr Kasonde in my presence and that of two others and asked him the cause of the delay in paying me the damages that had been agreed would be paid. Mr Kasonde's response was that he was still waiting for the go ahead from the President. It never came. Instead Mr Kasonde was removed by Mwanawasa.

It is wrong for governments to try to kill people, shooting and maiming them in the process because of their political views, driving them from their homes, destroying their livelihood and hounding them in whatever way possible. They suffer, their families suffer and the country wastes a lot of money maintaining the infrastructure and human or inhuman resources these activities require. I am happy that the Zambian government has agreed to settle on damages in the matter of numerous human rights violations against me and that Mr Rupiah Banda has played a part in it.”

Dr Chongwe stated that the decision of the United Nations Human Rights Committee was a public document and could be googled on the Internet by those who want to read it.

“The Communication Number is 821/1998 and the case is Rodger Chongwe vs. The Zambian Government,” stated Dr Chongwe.

But home affairs minister Mangani told the state media on Sunday that Dr Chongwe has since the judgment almost 10 years ago been pushing to be paid that amount but the government was still negotiating.

“Dr Chongwe took the matter of the Kabwe shooting incident to a court in Australia where Zambia lost the case because no official from government attended any of the court sessions there. The court ordered that Dr Chongwe be paid US $2.5 million and he has been pushing for that amount since then,” Mangani said.

Mangani, who denied The Post story that President Banda had authorised payment of US $5.9 million to Dr Chongwe as compensation, said his ministry would investigate thoroughly and establish the people leaking such information to the media, which he described as inaccurate. He said the government would not take kindly to people leaking inaccurate information bordering on national security with the aim of blackmailing the government and President Banda.

Mangani said Dr Chongwe's issue required legal opinion, hence the move by President Banda to write the Attorney General Mumba Malila seeking his opinion and guidance.

“And even that does not mean the President authorised the payment. But even the US $2.5 million needs to be negotiated and at no time did the President authorise that the money be paid to Dr Chongwe,” Mangani said.
He said those alleging that President Banda authorised the payment should provide evidence to that effect.

Labels: CORRUPTION, HEALTHCARE, ROGER CHONGWE

posted by MrK @ 5:15 AM