PATRIOTIC Front media director Sunday Chanda has insisted that 2021 presidential hopeful Kelvin Bwalya Fube remains expelled from the ruling party and that failure to serve him with an expulsion letter was just a technicality.

And Chanda has advised Bwalya to write to the central committee of the party to find out if the amnesty that was extended to former members applied to him.

Recently, KBF insisted that he was still a member of the PF because he never received any expulsion letter.

But commenting on this in an interview, Chanda said the party had pronounced itself on Bwalya’s matter to the effect that he remained expelled from the PF until he sought readmission through the party secretary general’s office.

“My advice to comrade KBF would be to write to the secretary general and understand whether that amnesty applied to him or not; whether it’s a case of him applying for readmission to the party or not. Failure to serve him with an expulsion letter was a technicality and whether or not that technicality could hold and whether or not that’s a defense he wants to count on remains something that only he should be able to do. But ordinarily, I think he has to put everything to rest and the only way that he can do that is by raising those issues to the secretary general and the central committee to see whether or not his issues can be resolved and what his status looks like,” Chanda said.

Chanda said such technicalities were common.

“Technicalities also happen with court processes, you would find that there are instances where there is a common and someone would contest that they were never served with a summon. Sometimes it’s also to do with issues of delivery and sometimes it could be that a person who is not entitled to receive summons or letters of expulsions probably received it. So there are a number of things and we could all speculate but that’s just a technicality. And whether or not he was served with the letter becomes an issue that only himself could argue and the only way he could do it is not by giving statements in the media but by following procedure because the only office that offers such letter is the office of the secretary general on behalf of central committee,” Chanda said.

“So he needs to just follow up with that office especially that there have been statements from the secretary general that comrade KBF remains expelled from the party. It’s only right that he follows up so that he understands the status of his membership with the party. If he finds that indeed he was expelled and then he says that there was an amnesty then it will be a question of whether that amnesty had applied to him or not. If that amnesty was there but didn’t apply to his case then he has the right to apply to the central committee for readmission into the party. The procedure is very clear and comrade KBF having been a long standing member of the party understands procedure and how these processes ought to go.”

Asked to comment on KBF’s concern that he was required to apply for readmission and wait for three years before he could be given any party role when it was not the same for other returning members, Chanda said that was up to the central committee’s discretion.

“You need to understand that the starting point for a member who leaves or a member who is expelled, there is one situations that would happen that this particular member would have to apply for readmission. Of course the party constitution is very clear that such a member would have to wait for three years before they can be given any official role to play in the party. However, the constitution also places prerogative and discretion on central committee to waiver and they can exercise that discretion as in the case of GBM, also in the case of other people who had left and had to come back. So that question really is a matter of discretion,” said Chanda.

“That’s why I am saying that the best thing for comrade KBF to do would be firstly to write to the secretary general and raise his concerns. If he has not been served an expulsion letter, let him raise that matter in a very former way to say that he has noted the sentiments and announcements to the effect that he was expelled and that he remains expelled from the Patriotic Front. He can also raise the issue that he has not been served with an expulsion letter, that is assuming he has not been served, and again that’s a technicality. Then let him also find out if the amnesty he referred to applies in his case. Once that has been done then it will be up to him to decide whether he has to apply for readmission into the party or not”.