Africa-Press – Zambia. Today marks eight months since the passing of Zambia’s Sixth Republican President, Dr. Edgar Chagwa Lungu, in South Africa. Yet, to the shock and sorrow of the See, our former Head of State still remains unburied following the Government of Zambia’s decision, through the Attorney General, to halt his burial by obtaing an injunction from the South African High Court on 25th June 2025, the very day the late President was to be buried in South Africa.
Let me declare interest here, President Edgar Chagwa Lungu was a personal friend from our time together at the University of Zambia. This as it may be, the failure to put put him to rest eight months after his passing, is an unprecedented and deeply painful chapter in our national history.
Regardless of political differences, the death of a former President should unite the nation in dignity, compassion, and respect.
Denying a timely and dignified burial to a former Head of State and blaming his family for it when you had acted to stop the planned burial, raises serious ethical and moral questions about our values as a people and as a Government.
We must ask: what moral justification can there be for prolonging the grief of a bereaved family and a mourning nation? In whose interest is the Government doing all this and for whose benefit? What message are we sending about our respect for leadership, humanity, and African cultural traditions that honour the dead?
Zambia is bigger than any political contest. Our humanity must never be sacrificed at the altar of political disputes.
I therefore urge the Government to reflect deeply on the moral implications of its actions and to act in a manner that restores dignity, compassion, and national unity, so that our Sixth Republican President may finally be laid to rest with the honour befitting the office he held.
May we remember that the way we treat our departed leaders is a mirror of who we are as a nation.
I thank you.
Signed
Sebastian C. Kopulande
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