CIVIL Society Constitutional Agenda (CiSCA) Bishop John Mambo has asked President Edgar Lungu to relieve Lusaka Province Minister Bowman Lusambo of his duties, saying he is disrespectful and unfit for public office.

And Bishop Mambo has condemned President Lungu’s remarks against the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC), saying it is actually ordinary Zambians on the streets who want him out.

In an interview, Bishop Mambo said Lusambo was careless.

“We just have to bring this to an end by bringing people to behave. Here is a man who is saying Kaunda’s children are poor because in their 27 years of power, they should have had stolen money. Here is a minister who is saying K2 million is pocket money, so what do you mean the Anti-Corruption Commission wants to remove you? Here is a minister who cannot be fired or disciplined for saying such careless things,” Bishop Mambo said.

“People like Bowman should never be allowed to serve in such high positions of power because all they know is to insult and demean people, and anyway, PF is just full of disrespectful people. PF’s arrogance of one of its leaders saying ‘we shall rule until 1000 years’, Zambians cannot be fooled. We’ve seen this before. Kaunda, the one we [are] insulting now, which we shouldn’t, is the founding father of our country. So you cannot insult your father, it’s unZambian, it’s not our culture, it’s uncalled for. Immediately that was done, he would have simply fired him to show that arrogance has no room in this country. Here is Archbishop Telesphore Mpundu saying the same thing about Bill 10 and he’s called rubbish by very junior officers. So this must come to an end.”

And Bishop Mambo said corruption was written on PF official’s faces.

“Corruption is written on everyone’s forehead in the ruling elite because the same Anti-Corruption Commission which they are rubbishing today, if it takes them to court, before even the case commences, they start intimidating the magistrate or the judge indirectly by saying ‘someone is innocent until proven guilty’. Now the same ruling elites are always in the Auditor General’s report, latest being the one which we’ve had recently over the sale of Mukula trees. Millions of dollars are going missing, but no one has been arrested or accounted for. The same thing has happened on things that we’ve had in the past, talk about the ambulances, the fire tenders and all that. This literally encourages corruption because…who appoints the Anti-Corruption Commission? Who ratifies them? The head of Anti-Corruption Commission is a judge, is he (President Lungu) saying that that judge doesn’t know what they are doing? Can the President no longer trust the people he appointed by himself?” Bishop Mambo asked.

“What we are saying is that institutions of good governance have been captured by the ruling elite in this country and as long as the Head of State is quiet about this, theft and daylight robbery will never stop in Zambia. The only thing that we can do is to go back to 2019 where we said ‘enough is enough’. Come 2021, we should simply say ‘we can never go with people who have never been tested with power’, the other day you were in Katondo street, tomorrow you are a champion of democracy, the other day you are corrupt and nothing works. We cannot continue like that and all we are encouraging you is that kind of stealing that is happening is not good for the country. Corruption is a cancer that has eaten our economy just as bad as COVID-19 has. As we talk and sound as if we are glorifying corruption, we are encouraging more people to steal and what will happen in the near future is that we will have a country of mafias.”

Bishop Mambo insisted that President Lungu allegations against the ACC were in bad taste.

“The President’s excuses are baseless and the statement against ACC is just in bad taste coming from the Head of State. He’s the one who appoints all these officials, how do you appoint bad egg and later on ratified by Parliament? It means that all those that go through Parliament, they are people we cannot trust, they are people who are ready to corrupt day in day out. But the truth of the matter is just that this government and its commander have failed and they shouldn’t look for people to blame for their own failures. And such sentiments from the Head of State against law enforcement agencies just makes sad reading in the fight against corruption. The real people that want PF out are the Zambians in markets and bus stations, not ACC and the FIC, no!” said Bishop Mambo.