Kabanshi can’t kill a fly, criminals have sacrificed her – Kambwili

NDC Consultant Chishimba Kambwili speaks to journalists at Drug Enforcement Commission (DEC) offices shortly after he lodged a complaint against PF party's money laundering and criminal activities associated with presidential empowerment fund in Lusaka on July 31, 2018 - Picture by Tenson Mkhala

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NDC Consultant Chishimba Kambwili speaks to journalists at Drug Enforcement Commission (DEC) offices shortly after he lodged a complaint against PF party's money laundering and criminal activities associated with presidential empowerment fund in Lusaka on July 31, 2018 - Picture by Tenson Mkhala

Chishimba Kambwili says dismissed Community Development minister Emerine Kabanshi is a decent woman who can’t even kill a fly, but she has been sacrificed to protect the real criminals in government.

And Kambwili says a group of Cabinet ministers working with PF Secretary General Davies Mwila, calling itself Luapula United is mobilising to oust President Lungu at the party convention.

On Wednesday, President Lungu fired Kabanshi who is the PF Luapula member of Parliament following revelations of embezzlement of UKAid amounting to over US$4 million under her ministry.

But Kambwili who is Roan PF member of parliament and former Chief Government spokesperson, said President Lungu’s decision was a joke of the year.

“It is the biggest joke of the year that Emerine Kabanshi has been fired over the cash transfer saga and it is betrayal of hard working and innocent people to continue being fired, leaving the actual thieves in government. I can vouch for Kabanshi that Kabanshi is a very clean woman. She has no skeletons whatsoever, she is not a corrupt woman. Just like I can vouch for the young man Vincent Mwale, just like I can vouch for ba Inonge Wina. Kabanshi has been used as a sacrificial lamb to show the donors that the President cares. In any case, if you talk about corruption in Zambia, the first person to resign should be President Lungu because he is corrupt individual number one,” Kambwili charged.

“Kabanshi is a clean woman and even if they investigated her, I would be vindicated that the woman is so clean. Obviously I can only blame her for having not taken action when she heard that there was this scandal to the cash transfer. But knowing how Cabinet works, I know that the woman must have reported to the President. The President has already told us that he had instructed the Secretary to the Cabinet to take administrative investigation. Now if he had instructed the Secretary to the Cabinet, it simply means that the minister had reported to him that Zampost had actually misapplied donor funds. So to fire her just to please the donors is extremely unfortunate. I hope and trust that my colleagues who have remained in PF are seeing how inconsistent and untrustworthy President Lungu can be to people who work hard.”

And Kambwili says a group of Cabinet ministers working with PF Secretary General Davies Mwila, calling itself Luapula United was mobilising to oust President Lungu at the party convention.

They have created a group called Luapula United headed by the secretary general of the party and the thieves, the major thieves in PF who are stealing with Lungu, and they have been sponsoring people to sit on the structures, strategically to come and upset Lungu but he cannot fire them because they steal with him. Some of these ministers today hire planes and helicopters to go to their constituencies, some of these ministers today are building churches, a number of churches from their own pockets in their constituencies and yet we know how much they get,” said Kambwili.

“Lungu must be very careful because the same people he is protecting have come up with a group that they are calling Luapula United, they have been having meetings and using the same corrupt money to put people in the structures so that when the convention comes, whether Lungu stands again, they beat him. We know the so called top 10 corrupt ministers in the PF, they are known as the Top 10, he has left them. Look at the corruption at the Ministry of Defence, and he has not fired anybody at the Ministry of Defence. The OP tells Lungu what these ministers are doing but he decides to go and fire an innocent woman who cannot even kill a fly. Kabanshi is so decent that she cannot even kill a fly, what a shame! Heaven is watching you Lungu, you leave a plank in your own eye, you go and see a spec in Kabanshi’s eye, God is watching you.”