National Democratic Congress vice-president Josephs Akafumba has announced that party ‘consultant’ Chishimba Kambwili and Secretary General Mwenya Musenge have reconciled, after a four-hour long meeting in Lusaka today.

And Akafumba says Musenge’s letter to the Registrar of Societies must be ignored.

Addressing the press today, Akafumba said NDC had resolved its internal matters.

“I wish to put is clear that there is no such letter which has been submitted to the Registrar of Societies. What is circulating should be ignored with the contempt it deserves. However, just like any other party in Zambia and elsewhere, we have had our own internal misunderstanding which we have chosen to resolve in-house. We have had a lengthy meeting with our secretary general, Mr Mwenya Musenge, who is still currently on leave. We called him to come and shed more light on this letter which I have already told you that it is neither here nor there,” Akafumba said.

“However, it is worth noting that we have had our own internal challenges as I stated and we have made all attempts to resolve them. We therefore urge all our members in the rank and file to continue organizing the party and more so in Roan constituency and Bahati where there will shortly be by-elections…we are not going to allow misunderstandings to bring down our party. Therefore, members should desist from commenting on non issues.”

Akafumba also said Speaker of the National Assembly Dr Patrick Matibini over-stepped his mandate when he declared the Roan seat vacant because he made interpretations which were only expected from the Constitutional Court.

“Personally as a lawyer, I don’t agree with the reasons [he gave] but he is in charge of the Legislature. My understanding is that the Legislature legislates but I think he went into interpreting what should have been the preserve of the Constitutional Court. But however, that has been done and we accept but it is setting a very dangerous precedent, it should not have been that way,” said Akafumba.

Meanwhile, when asked to explain events of the past week given that he had been Kambwili’s good friend for a long time, Musenge, who was present at the briefing, said as Secretary General, his preoccupation was growing the party.

“Nothing much transpired. We are talking about issues that affect the party and as secretary, my interest is to grow the party and when there are serious issues that I feel are affecting the smooth operation of the party, it becomes a serious concern to me. So probably, in the way it was handled, it could have created a bit of some problems here and there, but I think we have learnt one or two things. That’s the reason why today we sat and discussed at length and whatever issues have come up, we will be able to table them. In the next few weeks, we will be sitting with my colleague to try and see whether we can reach a common ground so that we can quickly forge ahead and continue mobilizing,” said Musenge.

Asked if Kambwili was still consultant, Musenge said; “The issue of consultant no longer exists. We are looking at something more permanent. Very soon, the party will be sitting to see how we can normalize our relationship in the party. Currently he doesn’t have a position but very soon, the nation will know.”

Musenge also denied being paid by the ruling party to drown the NDC.