Africa-Press – Zambia. The reasons given by President Lungu’s family, as to why he is not yet buried, have grown up before our very eyes.
1. New born – President Lungu left instructions that his body should be transported home in a private plane. His reasons were that he travelled for treatment as a private citizen, after the government had refused to evacuate him. So, he left strict instructions for his body to return the same way.
2. Toddler – President Lungu said he did not want his successor anywhere near his body. So President Hichilema must undertake to officiate the funeral while keeping a loooong distance from the body.
3. Teenager – the government changed the burial programme. They are also paving the road to Chifwema, meaning the route for the daily passage of the body, from the residence to Mulungushi, has been compromised.
4. Adult – We are going to bury in South Africa to ensure that we prevent President Hichilema from taking possession of the body, literally or figuratively.
5. Senile – Secretary to the Cabinet has not written us a letter we want. The letter is to state to us that the accusation we made is untrue. The accusation we want denied, in writing, is that the Zambian government, through a group that did not include a single Zambian, that, according to us, appeared at the mourtury, tried to carry out a post-mortem on President Lungu’s body. The post-mortem was to prove (or disprove) the claim, made by some random Souh African group, that he was poisoned.
Oh, another grievance is that Archbishop Alick Banda, the family negotiator, is being attacked in Zambia for something that has absolutely nothing to do with the funeral, the body or the burial.
There is an important lesson to be learnt from all this.
It is that emotional manipulation or theatrics should never cause an individual, group or society to depart from what is known to be logical, right, cultural or lawful.
The Lungus, by sounding passionate and highly aggrieved, managed to convince a good part of the country that their rather bizarre reasons, for breaking every known Zambian funeral cultural norm, were justified.
What do we do now with this reason that has reached the age where it is walking with a cane, and has forgotten its own name??
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