INSPECTOR General of Police Lemmy Kajoba says Lusaka Lawyer Makebi Zulu was speculating by suggesting that a UPND cadre participated in the questioning of his client, Chisanga Chanda, who he claimed was also kept at an undisclosed location.

And Kajoba has commended police officers for exhibiting professionalism under serious provocation by the youths who invaded a mine in Muombe, Chembe district.

On Monday, Police in Lusaka formally charged and arrested their deputy commissioner and former president Edgar Lungu’s Aide De Camp, Chisanga Chanda, for allegedly assisting a wanted suspect.

Zulu said he had been informed that a UPND cadre also participated in the questioning of his client, adding that he was also asked to disclose the people who were close to Lungu and where PF got campaign vehicles.

He told journalists that Chanda was never put in police cells, but was taken to an undisclosed place in Kalundu.

But in an interview, Tuesday, Kajoba said Zulu was speculating, and that the police did not have safe houses where they kept suspects other than the police cells.

“That is speculative because if the counsel brought that to the Journalists, he should have told you. What does he expect the police to do? To speculate like him, no. If there is a particular person that police have picked, we inform their lawyers. We don’t hide and we put people in cells. We don’t have any safe houses where to hide suspects. We conduct our investigations openly where at the end of the day when we decide to detain and charge someone, we detain at an open police cell where that person can be accessed by his relatives and of course their legal lawyers. In the course of investigations, the person the police were looking for was found in his home. So, to conclude your investigations, you also ask the people who were in the house at that particular time, that’s all,” Kajoba said.

Kajoba also commended police officers for exhibiting professionalism under serious provocation by the youths who invaded a mine in Muombe, Chembe district.

“We have always urged our police officers to be professional in discharging their duties. A police officer should not be moved by personal emotions. We must be professional in the way we look at situations. And I commend the police officers, the calmness that they exhibited under very serious provocation but they remained calm. And when visited the following day, they professionally acted, arrested and charged the people. That is how it is supposed to be. Because you are bound to make a serious mistake when you are driven by emotions,” said Kajoba.

Speaking to journalists at Woodlands Police Station, Monday, Zulu said he had been informed that a UPND cadre also participated in the questioning of his client.

“Amongst those who were interrogating our client, we have been informed was a UPND cadre who participated in the questioning of our client. Our client was never put in police cells, but he was put at an undisclosed place in Kalundu. Together with him was his wife who was only released this morning, there was a friend of the wife who went to visit who was apprehended, the garden boy was also apprehended, the driver was also apprehended. They were all being questioned and have since been released this morning except for two other people whose whereabouts we are not aware of,” said Zulu.

“But what is disheartening is what our client has been subjected to all this period, a period of which he was being questioned as regards things that were not related to the subject of the arrest amongst which was ‘where did the PF get the vehicles which they were using to campaign’ and wanting disclosure as to where the vehicles were got. He was being asked ‘you know who is related with president Edgar Lungu, tell us the people that were close or visiting president Edgar Chagwa Lungu in the various places that he was going to’.”