By Bennie Mundando
AFTER two days of a Mickey Mouse affair between opposition United Party for National Development (UPND) and police over the reported summoning of UPND president Hakainde Hichilema, police now say he was not summoned.
Two days ago, the UPND claimed that police in Chinsali had summoned Mr. Hichilema and Sesheke UPND Member of Parliament Romeo Kang’ombe for questioning and that the duo were supposed to avail themselves on Tuesday, October 21, 2020 at 09:00 hours.
The UPND claimed police officers from Force Headquarters in Lusaka on Friday attempted to serve the summons on Mr. Hichilema at the UPND Headquarters in Lusaka after 17.00 hours but failed because there was no senior person to sign the summons.
But when asked if Mr. Hichilema has been served with summons and if he will be appearing on Tuesday, police spokesperson Esther Katongo said he was not summonsed.
“No. he has not been summoned. We also wish to dispel reports that the opposition UPND leader, Mr. Hakainde Hichilema, is among those summoned,” Ms. Katongo said.
And Ms. Katongo has warned UPND cadres planning to go to Muchinga to give “solidarity” to their leader to abort the mission immediately as doing so will amount to unlawful assembly or conducting an illegal procession.
“Having monitored some social media posts in which some UPND officials are calling for people to go and give solidarity to those members of the UPND summoned by Police in Muchinga Province, we wish to advise them not to proceed as doing so will be tantamount to unlawful assembly or conducting an illegal procession which is against the law.
“There is no need for sympathizers, in this regard, to come into conflict with the law. As per our mandate of maintaining law and order in the country, we will be at hand to do just that. We therefore advise all those planning to travel to Muchinga Province for the above mentioned reason to rescind their decision,” she said.
