Minister of Home Affairs, Stephen Kampyongo said that the conveners did not follow the provisions of the Public Order Act.
Mr. Kampyongo added that travel documents for the conveners of foreign origin have since been confiscated.
Eight peopled died while dozens were in injured in a stampede as peopled jostled to enter the Olympic Youth Development Centre were Church of Christ in partnership with another organisation called Lesedi were due to handout free food hampers.
And the Home Affairs Minister says incidents of crime in the country have continued to decline.
Mr. Kampyongo explained that since January, 2017, Lusaka has recorded 16 murder cases and 8 aggravated robbery cases.
He said during the same period in 2016, Lusaka recorded 19 murder and 146 aggravated robberies.
Mr. Kampyongo has also appealed to members of the public to work with the Zambia Police Service in the fight against crime.
He said this in Parliament when he made a ministerial statement on the recent murders in Lusaka Province.
PF should be blamed for these deaths .Its the PF government that brought joblessness ,poverty and lack of strategic planning thereby causing people to go stampede for food.
Where there is no vision, the people perish -Proverbs 29:18.
What a load of tosh.
Apologise to the families and offer them help and anyway you can.
The whole lot are out of their depth.
Thanks
BB2014,16
The bigger suspect is HH who orchestrated this stampede just so he could have a chance to make a derogatory speech toward Lungu. Those conveners have no respect for human life, this throwing of food at people was done at the amuse of those ba Mwila. Inquest now!
“Stephen Kampyongo said that the conveners did not follow the provisions of the Public Order Act”
The government itself did not follow the provisions of the Public Order Act in the first place by allowing
the event to proceed. An opposition political rally with a very little chance of a stampede as happened
at OYDC would not have been permitted to go ahead on ‘security grounds’ …
HH sold the mines and pocketed the money. many people died due to depression when HH did this. He even brags that when other died and suffered terribly, he came out smiling. PF has nothing to do with the deaths. UPND and HH and something to do with the people who died, were made homeless, property destroyed, chased out of Southern province, etc, simple because they were not Tonga. We have not forgotten. Do not try to think you are saints. You sadists of the worst kind. You never even apologised. Not even your chiefs. We have not forgotten.
No we have not forgotten how HH and UPND turned non Tongas in southern province into refugees. HH and UPND never apologised nor sensor their cadres. We have not forgotten!!!!! Tell HH we have not forgotten!!!!
Asigai that is one humongous load of hate you are carrying on your shoulders, keep carrying it. After all you just a pawn in the game of chase. When you tired ask another pf riff ruff to help you carry, it changes nothing at all.
@Mushota Sometimes you act as a human! Or are you only acting!
Lusaka Times continues to use mediocre reporters. Do these guys even have editors? The spelling errors are rife in this article, even though spell check is free. The article itself lacks details. What’s this organization called Lesedi? Where did they come from? Under what circumstances? The article just says “foreign conveners.” Did they come from Mars or Jupiter? And why did they decide to give out free food? Please be investigative journalists, if you want to be professional. And then mixing of two unrelated stories in the same article is not professional either. Half the article is about the stampede, and the other half is about the declining crime in the country.
You could have carried out that social experiment anywhere in the world and obtained the same results. Humans are hardwired to compete for resources. It is a Rat Race. Have you ever seen what happens in the USA during black Monday when items go on sale? there are stampedes and people have been hurt. People did not flock to get the food because they are starving, it is because the food was free. In this case the organizers should be held accountable. We should not be encouraging freeloading, instead people ought to work. And no the government doesn’t create jobs, it is individual entrepreneurship. That is the spirit we need in this country. And this could have happened under any government. Some of the people in those lines have jobs, but who doesn’t want free food?
@Nubian Princess @Nsimbi you obviously don’t sleep very well at night obsessing with HH ! The government is quick to shift the blame onto everyone else “conveners of foreign origin” instead they should be apologising to the nation for allowing the exports of our maize to our neighbouring countries which has now caused a shortage and increase in prices. What has the crime rate and aggravated robberies got to do with this tragic incident !!!!
As usual, instead of dealing with the issue at hand they get into defence mode. How did 32,000 people find themselves at OYDC? As the crowd was ballooning where were the police? If it was 4 UPND cadres meeting the whole police force would have been mobilized in no time. Or if the food distribution had succeeded without incident the same PF would have claimed credit.
There is no way foreigners would use OYDC, a GRZ facility, without govt knowing.
Look here you ugly bald headed empty tin. We are not interested in your so called suspects when we know that you are the guilty liable government . When things go bad you shy away from your responsibility. Had you been an effective government no one would be starving and we wouldn’t lose lives. I hope such a thing leads to some one close to you dying so that you feel the pain those poor people going through. Lungu is an evil chap
Kampyongo is a suspect. Preliminary investigations have revealed that the police were approached to help with crowd control but it looks they declined. IG shud b answerable too
Was this xmas time for this Church to distribute food. Was this a long term solution to the peoples poverty?
You should work with them and come up with a safe and amicable way of feeding the hungry. That’s what a reasonable leadership would do. How can you arrest someone who is feeding your people?
In other countries IG should have stepped down pending investigations
Was IG informed to provide protection for large crowds? This is why law and order provides for things to be planned. In civilized societies you cannot just work up and do things haphazardly, which results in the loss of life. You must be responsible for whatever happens. It does not matter what your gesture is, you must follow principle of responsibility and respect for the law of the land. Public order act has not been repealed and it is a good peace of legislation to deal with reckless and dangerous actions that would lead in a loss of life.
Come on shameless government, no sympathy for the people who died. How do you charge citizens who are trying to acquire free food which you in government don’t provide. Very foolish idea of charging starving citizens who happen to be hungry and searching for means to stay alive. You should be talking about ending hunger or coming up with solutions to meet people’s needs. This government scrapped subsidies and the effects are hitting the people hard. Look at how well fed these chaps in government, I see why it is very easy to forget people are starving out there.
“And the Home Affairs Minister says incidents of crime in the country have continued to decline.”
Surely this is a Home Affairs Minister speaking..this is what happens when you put Grade 12s in such positions..a smart individual would talk performance targets for Provincial Police Commissioners and Governance issues..but what we have are utter empty tins who think brainstorming is a fancy haircut!!
You teach a person how to catch fish.not hand out it like a parent gaving his children cash instead of educations
They were wrong. Deliver, food aid to correct homeland aid agencies. Not run your own programme in a foreign country.
Oh and the stampede was over a bag of Mealie Meal, and a bag if dried beans. Can you believe that people in Zambia have lost their dignity?
All churches have a duty to carry out charity work and no one will ever manage to stop them. You PF guys, why do you always blame people who do right and forget to see your own wrongs. If there is a suspect here it is PF which has wrecked so much misery in the country. Stop blaming the church. Has chakolwa even visited the believed families.
IT WOULD BE STOLEN ZAMBIANS HAVE A REPUTATION NOW,
It would have been turned into pf campaign materials, remember that organization from the US that gives out shoes how tasila abused those materials to campaign for her father, even projects funded by donors, pf cadres will singing hymns that “pf government” what, what
We all need someone to blame when we dont want to accept responsibility.
Which charge will hold up in which Court ?
You retard that guys did not get a permit so that Police could provide crowd control. Are you reasoning with your but**s?
This was an unfortunate accident, we all need to exercise maturity and not point political fingers. Let the Law take its course, its sad that a gesture of kindness turned into an ill planned exercise that resulted in 8 deaths!
Secondly the media should report facts and not jump to sensational headlines that can lead to anxiety as was the case where even the highly respected Lsk Times earlier said dozens of people died when in fact the number was less! Please stick to the facts.
Top Govt officers should non the less take note of the root cause that led this to happen. Maybe they will forego their huge allowances and Luxury SUVs so that those funds can be better used in one way or the other to help the more vulnerable in society.
2020, am totally in consent with you. The Pf governmnt needs to cut costs in so many areas & channel the funds to DMMU to feed the poverty stricken people especially in the compounds. As to this case the incompeted Kanganja must resign. Kanganja is the cause of this disaster & no one seems to get it. Clips clearly shows that the police he assigned were inadequate for such a huge mass of people. The incompetent IG were notified of this feeding programme & for two weeks this organisation has been running adverts about it. It also seems Kampyongo doesn’t read or is seriously dull to take such an action when this thing was in public domain all along. Eish these incompetents!
Condolences to the family. To Kampyongo and his team of lunatics – reflect on how you can empower the people of Zambia to be able to fend for themselves. That wealth you are using to fly around and appoint your relative cadres in foreign mission if used prudently can prevent such an occurrence. Good day .
This PF rule amounts to ” governing by emotions” .Treat these conveners as suspects ,treat violent PF cadres as ‘party patriots” and conveners of peaceful opposition rallies as security threats.
Very sad indeed. The minister seems to be doing the right thing. The organizers are suspects and the law must visit them. Zambia has systems in place to deal with issues of charity as well as public gatherings. Minister you are right people must answer. Those involved need to be apprehended to answer questions.
THE GOVERNMENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF ZAMBIA SHOULD BE HIGHLY EMBARRASSED AT THE HAPPENING. HONESTLY HOW DO YOU BLAME THE PEOPLE THAT CAME TO DONATE. SHAME ON THE ZAMBIAN GOVERNMENT. MY DEEPEST CONDOLENCES TO THE BEREAVED FAMILIES. I NEVER THOUGHT I WOULD SEE THIS HAPPEN IN OUR COUNTRY. HONESTLY ZAMBIANS LET US WAKE UP AND STOP BEING CHEATED DURING CAMPAIGNS BY TELELA CHITENGES AND FIFTY KWACHAS. WHEN WE THE OLD PEOPLE START CRYING FOR KAUNDA S RULE THEN IT MEANS THE COUNTRY IS IN A CRISIS.
Kampyongo and Hypocrite Mwila, PF is cerebrating at the death of innocent Zambians. PF is aware there is hunger and suffering in Zambia and sell maize to Malawi corruptly, the unemployed youths have been left dry and Lungu is busy touring the whole world as if every thing in the country is functioning well while majority Zambians are suffering. Cause of the stampede was lack of food in the nation. To boast of enough maize meal in Zambia is really insulting Zambians. With this in mind PF is cerebrating at the death of Zambians ‘Sontha apo wapaile bakayele’.
Reply
The next 5 years of vision-less leadership will be characterised by such scenes. They have stolen all the money even the most heartless shy-locks are scared to extend credit to PF govt. So hunger is looming on the horizon.
Government must accept responsibility for police incompetence! Period! Government failed in its duty, government is not a rival opposition party, it is the Government! Not endless holidays at Jesus Tomb, with even fake conman pastors hitch-hiking on the Presidential jet to sell miracles on Facebook posing for pictures after their friend Lungu! What is this hell we are descending to?
A government which is always in the right, winanama country
Fake churches, always playing to the gallery. It’s a wrong way to make a name. Jesus said, when you give, let not your left hand know what your right hand is doing.
I don’t care how hungry these people were. None of them deserved to be killed over food.
Did I hear that correctly? 16 murder cases in less than 3 months is a national disaster. You see what I have been telling. the useless PF police have spent energy and money on innocent citizens while PF and other criminals are busy murdering innocent Zambian. And Lungu and Kanganja can’t declare this as a national disaster. PF is also to blame for the deaths because they have subjected Zambians to poverty while they live in affluence.
This church is known for being severely corrupt in the Philippines. They have multi billion loans and the leader, Eduardo Manalo, is severely persecuting his mother and siblings because they are standing up against the corruption. What happened in Zambia is unfortunate but is a manifestation of the corruption of the church organisers.
Stampede for foof?, therefore it is the government starting from the president who should be blamed or arrestred, they starved their people to the point that it created stampede and killed 8 africans, shame on you to pass on the blame, hypocrites!
Why blaming the organisers. If our country was totally in order no citizens will run for free food with all the involved risks.
Lack of risk assessment in the whole country.
Infact this Filipino organisation which is like the ‘ moonies’ would not come near Zambia, if our country was in order.
The conveners are not criminals the actually meant very well. Public Order act issues are after thoughts. If I was President Kampyongo and Kanganja would be fired for incompetence. The real criminals are the police, who are always reactive. For once be proactive.
This government has terribly failed. Show leadership and stop blame-shifting as stampede is not a creation of conveners. the whole catastrophe is a reflection of poverty levels in Zambia, a true manifestation of “Ubucushi, insala “!
@ jeffery Sanchez if that is your real name why blog now and blame another Country never seen your name before.
The problem is Zambia’s not a Phillipines church.My intelligent friend how do you link corruption to this. Go on explain how Phillipines corruption caused this national tragedy.
May the deceased RIEP may the families survive this tragedy.
How does anyone bring corruption into this. I am astounded.
@Nubian (SUDANESE) Princess what sort of person are you. 8 deaths and your comment is party political.
Show repect for the deceased and their families.
Are truly SUDANESE or did Nubian Princess sound good
The problem here was about management, surely there cannot be any free food if these people were told to pay something nothing nasty would have happened.
Everyone knows no one gives food without cost , the leaders failed to guide the recipients correctly .I would think these leaders are not good managers to lead crowds of people, you cannot put all those people at risk of death because of free food .
Every one wants free food but there must be some wisdom to give free food.
The real name of this church is not Church Of Christ. It is legally called Iglesia Ni Cristo of EVM, originated from the Philippines in 2009, and run by a cult leader Eduardo V. Manalo that commits oppression and human rights violation.
Don’t blame the conveners .!it is just sad for the loss of life. It was a peaceful arrangement turned ugly. Let not PF politicize the incident because the opposition hammered them.
In India it’s an offense to give alms to the needy or poor or beggars in the street.
The lesson learned was when you give one , everybody want to be given so they drag and rob the giver.
So the lesson has been learnt for what happened at OYDC.