Edgar Lungu, the former Zambian president who recently died at a hospital in South Africa, was a man who was living under siege.
Lungu was clamped down right from the time he was defeated in the presidential election by the opposition candidate Hakainde Hichilema in 2021.
In May last year, he complained, “I cannot move out of my house without being accosted and challenged by police, who drive me back home.”
“Police are under instructions to ambush me at night, abduct, embarrass, and forcefully detain me like a hardcore criminal.”
“As far as I am aware, I have not committed any crime that would warrant the government, through the police, to start scheming against me in this manner,” Mr Lungu added.
In September 2023, the police warned Lungu to stop jogging in public because his morning workouts alongside members of his Patriotic Front party amounted to “political activism” and “unlawful assembly” and therefore required a permit.
In that same month, he was prevented from travelling to South Africa for a medical review.
A letter written by the Deputy Secretary to the Cabinet on September 2, 2023, read “l wish to advise that authority has not been granted for your excellency to travel to South Africa for medical review. “
On another occasion, Lungu complained, “Recently, they took me out of a plane where I was supposed to travel for a conference.”
His family was not spared either.
Last year, his wife, former first lady Esther Lungu, and his daughter were arrested and charged with possession of property suspected to be proceeds of crime.
Although Lungu had retired from politics in 2021 after being defeated by Hichilema, in October 2023, he announced a comeback to politics, a move that prompted the government to withdraw all his retirement benefits.
Subsequently, in November 2024, the opposition Alliance endorsed him as their presidential candidate in the 2026 election to challenge President Hichilema.
But this was short-lived; a month later (Dec 2024), the courts barred him from vying in any future election.
Two months earlier (October 2024), President Hichilema had fired three judges who rejected his petition against Lungu in 2016. By then, Hichilema was an opposition politician and was challenging Lungu’s victory as president.
Lungu was first elected president in January 2015 to serve the remaining 20 months of his predecessor, President Michael Sata, who had died in office in October 2014. He defeated Hichilema by a narrow margin of just 27,757 votes.
Just two months after his election, he collapsed while giving a speech during International Women’s Day.
This caused panic among Zambians, considering that they had lost two serving presidents and a former president in a short space of time.
It was later discovered that Lungu suffered from a rare disorder that caused the food pipe to narrow.
Even though Lungu was praised for introducing progressive legislative reforms and infrastructural development during his tenure, he was also accused of high-handedness.
It is all about Karma then
In 2017, the police acting on his orders broke into opposition politician Hakainde Hichilema’s house and arrested him after throwing teargas canisters inside.
Hichilema was held in solitary confinement for eight days without food, water, light, or visitation and was tortured by having his penis sprayed with pepper.
Hichilema was charged with treason for refusing to give way to a presidential motorcade transporting Lungu.
At that time, Amnesty International released a report saying,
“There is fear for safety of Hakainde Hichilema after he was transferred from Lusaka Central Correctional Facility in Lusaka Province to Mukobeko Maximum Correctional Facility in Central Province.
He is being held under degrading and inhumane conditions at the Maximum-Security Prison. The conditions to which he is subjected may amount to torture and other ill-treatment.”
Hichilema was later released following international pressure from world leaders and international human rights organisations such as Amnesty International.
He went on to become president after defeating Lungu in 2021. Maybe he was just serving Lungu revenge.