By Linda Banks
Not vanished like a delayed policy statement, but vanished in a way that sent citizens refreshing their social media apps and relying on rumour for updates. The President relocated to Choma, and the nation was left with silence.
In that vacuum, the M23 government spokespersons stepped forward and filled the air with creative explanations. First, the President was said to be on a working holiday. Then the nation was told he was working on his own hustle. Zambians paused. Since when did governing a country become a personal side project? Especially considering that, like the rest of us, he had just enjoyed a long Christmas break, plus an extra day he added as a day of rest to commemorate the National Day of Prayer, a day he used to refer to as useless. That is a story for another day.
When President Hakainde Hichilema finally resurfaced, it was not with a national address or an economic roadmap in the final months of his presidency. It was with a handshake, or rather, a different one. The familiar right hand was retired and the left hand made a surprise debut. Analysts are still debating whether this was symbolism, strategy, or simply a quiet announcement that something had shifted.
What did not shift, however, was the instinct to pursue perceived enemies.
Almost immediately, police were dispatched to Malambo Constituency, where they raided the home of Makebi Zulu. Officially, the police said they were responding to an illegal meeting. Unofficially, the operation looked less like crowd control and more like a search mission.
A search for what, you ask? The body, of course. The ghost that is allegedly haunting him into hiding. Allegedly, BanaBaabo, allegedly.
Makebi Zulu is not just any lawyer. He is the spokesperson of the late former President Edgar Chagwa Lungu. In today’s political climate, that role appears to come with supernatural implications. Memory has become dangerous. Association has become suspicious. Grief has become a security concern.
#BanaBaabo – Let’s be honest, this was never about visitors. Zambia has never required permits for people to greet each other. Handshakes have never been illegal, whether performed with the right hand or the newly fashionable left. But when people gather at the home of the man who speaks for a departed president, the state suddenly develops nerves.
Police officers moved in as though acting on intelligence from a spiritual source. They attempted to disperse what they described as visitors, yet their urgency suggested something else. These were not visitors in the eyes of state paranoia. These were witnesses, or worse, participants in an imagined political ritual.
One could almost hear the unspoken fear. What if the body is here? What if memory refuses to stay buried? The fat pot-bellied Bujus whispered to one another. The largest one among them stepped forward with a shamboko under his arm, wagging a finger at the crowd and bellowing, “Disperse in the name of the President.” The crowd refused to be bullied.
Now on a serious note, this anxiety, this paranoia, is not without precedent. The same administration has previously arrested and imprisoned people suspected not of plotting harm, but of attempting to be with the President. Proximity alone became criminal. In that context, raiding the home of ECL’s spokesperson follows a certain twisted logic. If closeness is a crime, then mourning is treason.
The police searched in spirit, if not in fact. Cupboards were not opened, but suspicion filled every room. Faces were scanned. The question hung in the air, quietly and absurdly. Alimo? Is he here?
Nothing was found.
No body.
No ghost.
No political resurrection.
Only a lawyer standing on his own property, calmly reminding officers of the law and that they had better leave unless they had a search warrant. The police left quietly, rather sheepishly, as crowds loudly chanted Makebi’s name. Like men who realised they had been sent to chase ghosts while the country waited for governance, they retreated with their tails between their legs.
In a nutshell, the President disappeared for weeks while his spokespersons improvised explanations. He returned with a new handshake and immediately unleashed police on the spokesperson of a dead man. In this Zambia, the most feared opposition figure is not the one mobilising crowds, but the one preserving memory.
The question answers itself. Was this really about an illegal meeting, or was it about fear that the past still has an audience?
When a government panics over visitors more than inflation, and over gatherings more than jobs, confidence has already fled. When it fears a corpse more than corruption, the problem is not the opposition. It is a haunted State House mindset.
Zambia now lives in a republic where barbecue gatherings look suspicious, nshima can be mistaken for subversion, and lawyers are treated as undertakers of dangerous history.
The President is back from hibernation. The fear has returned with him. This time, he appears ready to govern not only against the living, but against the dead as well.
Kikikikiki! ati banabaabo. so you know that Malambo is Bisa territory?
However you don’t know that “Handshakes have been illegal” in Zed when they are done outside the ruling party. Since 1964, the red brick constantly monitor who is greeting who and quickly send police to disrupt this contaminating practice. As for using the left hand for greetings it’s to pass a message to Zambian Muslims not to imitate current Iranians in any way. Moslems who are quite a large community in Malambo don’t use the left hand as it is filthy
He injured his right working very hard.You work very hard with open legs so no need for suspitions here
The police left after work,in PF times,tear gass and that shambok could have been used with lethal intent.We have a very pofessional police service
Linda Banks is one of those frustrated and disgruntled persons who thought would have Jobs or
position in UPND government upon winning elections, now disappointed. She says negative things about HH.
It sounds strange for Zulu to be a “spokesperson of the late…”. Do the late usually have spokespersons, or are they sometimes somehow still there to be spoken for? Strange phrasing anyway, as if there’s someone to speak on behalf of
But ba UPND mulibe vochita. Balance, Kassy na mu Zambian, You gang up to speak nonsense on an article deserving a rational response. It just proves one blogger’s statement that Mweetwa whose ministry is wishy washy is using that portfolio’s budget to fund you for the election.
Their logic is if you can’t respond just insult. Most upnd cadres operate like that. That’s why me and my sister quit
It’s the wrongness party to ever rule Zed
Kikkikikiki it’s the wrongest party to ever rule Zed