University of Zambia (UNZA) management has dismissed UNZASU president Warran Hamusanga’s accusation that management attempted to dent his name after a non-verified financial report citing irregularities was leaked last week.

The financial report from the higher learning institution revealed that the Union spent K45,000 on President Edgar Lungu’s portrait and K68,000 for hosting a fresher’s bash, among other items, which Hamusanga denied, saying the financial report was for 2017 and 2018 when he was not UNZASU president.

He reacted by castigating UNZA management in an alleged scheme of trying to dent his name.

But in an interview, UNZA public relations manager Damasake Chibale said Hamusanga’s accusation was not true because UNZA management had nothing to do with the auditing of the Union.

“It’s actually just student politics and they are about to hold elections, and within UNZASU, there are some organs and each organ has a special organ. So, the student representative of council is basically trying to audit what their colleague is doing…So, now, they are still doing those audit queries. We wouldn’t want management to actually be dragged in the student activities and the audit,” Chibale said.

“What management is doing is to provide supervisory and oversight role on the activities of UNZASU and guide them accordingly. That is not correct for the current UNZASU president to bring in the UNZA management into disrepute and shame. That is not the reality on the ground.”

He said the new UNZASU constitution required that auditing was done before elections.

“As UNZASU, there are a number of organs that are involved, and the organ, which deals with students’ representatives or council, is the one that is just auditing the activities of the current UNZASU executive so that they are ready for the next elections so that we usher in a new administration,” said Chibale.

“So, actually, it is not management that is doing the audit under the new constitution that they have; there is a provision of about four to five organs and one of the organs, which is called student representative of council, is mandated to do the audit of the performance of any existing UNZASU executive at a particular point in time before the election and they are continuing that….That is a normal process that should take place, according to the (UNZASU) constitution.”