A postmortem carried out on Joseph Bwalya Chishimba, a Mbala based golfer who was on Monday morning shot dead in strange circumstances by an unnamed police officer in Chipata district, has shown that the deceased was shot three times.

And Zambia Golf Union (ZGU) has regretted Chishimba’s death, insisting that it was not an accident.

Chishimba, who was also a civilian officer of the Zambia Air Force (ZAF), led Chila and Samora Machel golf clubs from Northern Province to a golf tournament in Eastern Province which was held over the long weekend before he met his fate early Monday morning in Chipata.

But Eastern Province deputy police commissioner Geoffrey Kunda claimed that Chishimba had attempted to break into the ZRA cash office before a police officer on duty killed him with a stray bullet from a warning shot that was fired to stop the deceased from escaping.

“…this person now deceased, yesterday (Monday) around 03:00 hours, according to the allegation, went to ZRA Provincial offices. I don’t know how he managed to cross over the fence and he was attempting to open the entrance to the cash office. The officer who was on duty spotted him, [he together with another officer] actually heard some noise and they followed. But when he (the deceased) noticed that the police had spotted him, he started running away. The officers fired warning shots to make him stop. But the suspected criminal never adhered to this. Unfortunately, one of the stray bullets caught up with him and he was hit from behind through the stomach and was pronounced dead upon arrival at the hospital,” explained Kunda in an interview on Tuesday.

But impeccable sources have told News Diggers that a postmortem conducted on Wednesday showed that Chishimba was shot three times.

“The post mortem has just been conducted. Two bullets were found in the left leg and another one in the back, just near the stomach. He was shot from behind. And looking at the positioning of the bullet hole, it looks like he was shot when he was on the ground. The position by the commissioner is not correct, he just listened to the same officer who was involved and put out one side of the whole thing. So they need to name the same officer involved,” said the sources.

And a player from one of Chishimba’s golf teams said the officer who killed his captain had actually picked up a fight with the deceased and that it was not an accident.

“He was shot from the back and then the bullet came out from somewhere throgh the stomach. The police are saying he jumped into ZRA yard but that is not making sense actually. We suspect the police officer killed him after picking a fight because actually we’ve been told he drinks a lot. So probably there was some confrontation between them. Then they try and cover up the matter after discovering that he was a ZAF officer,” explained the golf player.

And ZGU president Jason Kazilimani also insisted in an interview that the allegation by police that Chishimba tried to steal from a ZRA office did not make sense because the deceased was a well to do man.

“Chishimba was a highly respected golfer, he was the captain for two golf clubs: Chila and Samora Machel, both in Mbala. This fact alone should tell you that he was held in high esteem by his peers in the golfing community. He was very instrumental in driving the junior golf development programme in Mbala. He was also in gainful employment as a civilian in the Air Force. He will be sorely missed by the golfing community. And the reported allegation that he was trying to break into the ZRA offices, to do what? He was in employment, so why would he do that? We don’t buy that, it does not make sense at all. His killing leaves a lot of questions and does not sit well with the golfing community,” said Kazilimani.