Maravi

DPP’s compromise will have political costs

DPP’s compromise will have political costs
By Editor
Mon 04 Jan. 2010, 04:00 CAT

Every lawless act leaves an incurable wound, like one left by a double-edged sword. And accordingly, Reuben Lifuka, the president of Transparency International Zambia, is very correct in his observation that the decision not to appeal against the clearly questionable acquittal of Frederick Chiluba will have political costs which will haunt Rupiah Banda and the MMD for a very long time to come.

And truly, “the handling of Chiluba’s acquittal and its aftermath is a classic example of what happens to the judiciary and the Director of Public Prosecutions’ office when these revered institutions become compromised”.

There is no doubt that the decision to acquit Chiluba was wrong. And given the high calibre of the court that was handling that case, that acquittal becomes highly questionable and people would not be blamed for thinking there was some serious compromise made. Also the decision by the Director of Public Prosecutions to withdraw the appeal that was lodged against the acquittal of Chiluba on the grounds that it was done without his permission raised a lot of questions about the independence and integrity of the Director of Public Prosecutions.

Firstly because the Director of Public Prosecutions knew very well that the Task Force on Corruption and its prosecutors did not need his permission to appeal Chiluba’s acquittal. And the authority for this was in a case that the Director of Public Prosecutions himself was a party to. This decision was in a recent ruling by judge Mwanamwambwa. When this lie by the Director of Public Prosecutions was exposed, he resorted to another lie. He started to claim that there was no merit in the grounds of appeal.

This position was rejected by many lawyers, including the Law Association of Zambia, who argued that the grounds of appeal against Chiluba’s acquittal were meritorious. After this, the Director of Public Prosecutions was thrown into quandary and had nothing to say. His political masters or handlers had to take over the matter. They started advancing political arguments to justify, not only the Director of Public Prosecutions’ decision, but also the court’s decision to acquit Chiluba in the first place.

There is no need to repeat what Rupiah, George Kunda, Mike Mulongoti and Ronnie Shikapwasha said on this issue to justify Chiluba’s acquittal and the Director of Public Prosecutions’ decision not to appeal. But it may be important to mention the fact that Rupiah himself claimed responsibility for the decision not to appeal Chiluba’s acquittal as his own. This raised serious constitutional violations on his part on one hand and on the Director of Public Prosecutions’ part on the other. This was a clear admission that Rupiah had usurped the powers of the Director of Public Prosecutions. It was also an admission that the Director of Public Prosecutions had abdicated his constitutional responsibility by surrendering his powers to Rupiah.

What happens or what should happen to constitutional office holders who abdicate or violate their constitutional responsibilities doesn’t need much disquisition: they have to vacate the constitutional offices they have disgraced. And accordingly, public demand for the Director of Public Prosecutions to resign started to flow. And these public demands were joined by the Law Association of Zambia, who articulated the issue much better.

But the response of Rupiah to these public demands was characterised by arrogance and frightening insensitivity.

He dismissed all these demands, maintaining that the Director of Public Prosecutions will not resign. Again, Rupiah has put himself in the position of the Director of Public Prosecutions, taking the decision for him not to resign. Rupiah did not say the Director of Public Prosecutions should not resign – which would have been advice. He said the Director of Public Prosecutions will not resign, indicating that he was speaking for him in a definite way.

But we know that if a person is insolent and arrogant, he may lose everything he has. If you refuse to accept correction, you are putting yourself in more trouble. It is said that a man may be famous as a good speaker, but when he is wrong, a sensible person will detect it. It is also said that a group of people who have no respect for the law is like a pile of kindling; they will meet a fiery end because the road they walk is smooth and paved, but it leads to the world of the dead.

As for Chalwe Mchenga, the current Director of Public Prosecutions, we can only say one thing: don’t set your heart on continuing as Director of Public Prosecutions unless you have the strength of character it takes to put an end to injustice and ensure equality of all our people before the law; if you let yourself be influenced by people like Rupiah and George, your integrity will be damaged forever; don’t commit any crime against the general public, and don’t disgrace yourself among your fellow citizens; if you do no wrong, no wrong will ever come to you; don’t plough the ground to plant seeds of injustice; you may reap a bigger harvest than you expect.

And collectively to Mchenga, George and Rupiah, our advice is: don’t commit the same sin twice, the punishment you get the first time ought to be enough; don’t think up lies to tell about others to justify your own evil intentions or actions; don’t tell lies at all because it never does any good.

We have gotten into a lot of trouble advocating our position that progressives should never compromise on their principles. This position has been found to be very controversial with a lot of people. Some have accused us of trying to be purists when we are not for taking that stand. None of these arguments against us are true or intellectually honest in any way, and we believe they represent an attempt to get progressive to abandon their principles in favour of corruption and opportunism.

We think dialogue is very important, and so is debate. What we also think is important is that people are able to express their position loudly and clearly without automatically being dismissed as this and that for taking any position that exists outside those held by those in power.

It is important that we distinguish between compromising on principles and compromising on policy. Arranging for the acquittal of Chiluba and refusing to appeal against this is not a compromise on policy but on principle.

And the principle at stake here is that of the rule of law, that of equality before the law, or equal protection of the law as is often phrased. It violates the principle that whether rich or poor, political ally of those in power or opponent, all are entitled to equal protection before the law. And under no circumstances should those in power impose additional inequalities; they should be required to deal evenly and equally with all citizens regardless of their social status or political affiliation.

The vast majority of us have never served in public office, and most people never will serve in public office, so we will never have the need or even the ability to compromise on policy. Our role as citizens is to take a stand on what we believe in and ensure that we hold our politicians and others who hold public office, constitutional or otherwise, accountable. Standing up to speak our minds as citizens of this country never requires any sort of compromise at all, and we cannot allow anyone to tell us that it does.

While none of us are ever going to be right about everything, there are often some very clear ethical principles which guide our views. And while we may sometimes get the details of how to handle certain policies wrong, we can often be certain that our views on basic fundamental principles are correct. We can be certain that it is always in our nation’s best interest to stand up for the rule of law, for the right to equality before the law and for general equal rights for all; we can always be certain that we should protect human rights and reject abuses of power and public office, and we can always be certain that we need to reject any policy which clearly violates the Constitution.

We need people who are able to stand up for the key principles such as human rights, rule of law, equality before the law and economic justice and the fight against corruption. We need people who speak loudly in opposition to those who want more abuses of power and public office, more tyranny, more nepotism and tribalism, more discrimination and violations of basic human rights. As citizens of this nation, we have no reason or incentive to cave in on the key principles that are important to us.

Now there are a few of us who may someday be elected to public office in which case it will be required that we compromise on certain policy positions if we want to accomplish anything. Even in the case of elected officials however, there are certain principles in which we need to demand that they do not compromise on issues such as equality before the law and the rule of law in general.

There can never be a compromise because once you compromise on the rule of law, on equality before the law, then those rights are no longer equal. We need to demand that our politicians and others who hold public office stand for the rule of law and equality before the law and we cannot accept anything less than this. There are no acceptable compromises to the rule of law, to equality before the law, to the eradication of corruption in public office.

And aside from the rule of law and equality before the law, there are some other issues as well that are very clear-cut, and we should never accept any attempt by our elected officials or those they have appointed to public offices to compromise on these issues. We cannot allow any compromise on our constitutional rights , we cannot allow any compromise on our opposition to corruption and abuse of power or public office, and we cannot allow any compromise when it comes to ensuring that every single Zambian has access to the services needed in an established community – the dignity that comes from having a solid roof over your heard, running water, education and health services.

While our elected leaders are forced to make some compromises on matters of policy, however as citizens, we do not have to compromise one bit. We need to keep pushing our vision for what a more just, fair and humane society looks like, and we need to make it clear that while certain compromises that our elected officials make may bring us a step in the right direction, they do not bring us where we need to go. Their compromises are not our compromises, we are still going to keep fighting for progressive principles.

Most of us are not elected officials, which means that most of us have no reason or incentive to compromise on anything in regards to our beliefs as to the direction this country should take. We do have an incentive however to make this country a better place, and the only way to do that is to fight for what we believe in and never back down from our core principles.

Labels: CHALWE MCHENGA, DPP, REUBEN LIFUKA, TIZ

posted by MrK @ 9:48 AM