In the audio below, Wynter Kabimba says the PF risks fielding an ineligible candidate in the 2021 general elections if they keep endorsing President Edgar Lungu without waiting for the court to declare him legally qualified to recontest the presidency.

And Kabimba says people must learn from Chishimba Kambwili’s expulsion from the PF that “those who kill by the sword die by the sword”.

In an interview with News Diggers! the Rainbow Party General Secretary wondered why the PF central Committee was bragging about endorsing President Lungu as a sole candidate ahead of the 2021 general elections when there was a court case pending adjudication on whether the incumbent qualified to contest the presidency for the third time.

“This matter is in court, I think there is an action that is pending by PF itself. By a group of people led by Reverend Dan Pule, they have taken this matter to court to seek the court’s interpretation. Before that interpretation comes, they are making that resolution. For me, it shows their impunity and contempt towards the Constitutional Court. They are accelerating this view which is being held by members of the public that our judiciary may not be independent of political influence. That is what they are doing. They are acting as if they know the decision of the court already because if they have lawyers there and Edgar himself being a lawyer, he should be telling them, ‘can you wait until this matter has been decided upon because we are the ones that took this matter to court’,” Kabimba observed.

“But also, if they are not careful about this matter, and they proceed the way they are proceeding, they may end up having a candidate running for elections even winning that election and going for an unconstitutional term which will haunt him in future. They may end up having a candidate who doesn’t qualify, who may even win the election and run an unconstitutional term and surely that will come round and haunt him when another government comes into office. So they have to be very careful, this is not a matter that they should play around with.”

Take a listen:

Kabimba feared that it was possible for the Electoral Commission of Zambia to allow an ineligible presidential candidate to contest polls.

“If you do not qualify but for some reason the ECZ in the situation in which we are, accepts your papers that you have qualified and after five years, another government comes into being and they say that the man did not qualify, it means that you were in office illegally. And he must be punished for that, so this is not a matter that they must be playing around with, this is a serious matter. What does it mean? It means that you must pay back all the emoluments that were paid to you in that five years. That’s my view,” he said.

“So this is not a party matter, it is a constitutional matter. It is one thing if you just don’t qualify under the party constitution and you qualify under the republican constitution but it is another thing even if your party says yes and the Constitution says no but you bulldoze your way through, it means you have committed an offence and all those individuals in those institutions that may have assisted you in doing that commit an offence and this is what comes to haunt people when they are out of office.”

And Kabimba reminded expelled Kambwili that those who live by the sword die by it.

“The only comment I can make on Kambwili is that there is a big lesson that those who kill by the sword shall die by the sword. Kambwili and his group thought that I was their impediment in their becoming presidents of the Patriotic Front and hence the concerted fight against me. And then now, I am sure he realizes that even without me, he is not getting that opportunity. So those who kill by the sword shall die by the sword.