By Patson Chilemba
Former Defence minister Davies Chama says President Hakainde Hichilema must let bygones be bygones and embrace former president Edgar Lungu as the sole remaining former president, saying the clergy from the Seventh Day Adventist Church (SDA) must prevail on him.
And Chama said it was unfortunate that fourth Republican president Rupiah Banda died at his home, given the state of the art health facilities around.
Speaking with Daily Revelation, Chama said it was now up to President Hichilema to realise that he was now President of the Republic.
“He needs to change from the politics of being in opposition to be the father of the nation, to be embracing, to be forgiving, to be a man of peace and reconciliation. It’s unfortunate that we have only remained with one surviving former president that is now president Edgar Chagwa Lungu,” Chama said. “And its up to the current president to bring president Lungu closer to him so that the two can work together to make sure that they truly bring healing and reconciliation in our nation.”
Chama said it was up to President Hichilema to initiate the move to “extend a hand to his brother so that they bring us all together as a nation”, during difficult times like this one when the nation has lost an elder statesman, a few months after the passing of the founding father Dr Kenneth Kaunda.
He said figuratively, president Banda as former president and elder statesman was viewed as a father figure, something Chama said fits president Lungu now, and hoped that the clergy, particularly those from the Seventh Day Adventist Church where President Hichilema is member, will prevail on him.
“Yes indeed, indeed in terms of years if we are to go by the age he’s the older statesman that we have remained with, and that’s why I am appealing to the current president to extend a hand of love and peace making to his brother,” Chama said. “And I think if I was him we should say let the bygones be bygones and let’s start afresh. But it’s up to him, I don’t know whether he has that spirit. I hope that a senior clergy, members of the Seventh Day can really maybe talk to him to say ‘you are president now and we have lost all the former presidents apart from Edgar Chagwa Lungu and we need this country to be peaceful and to make sure that we move in oneness together…that we support one another.’ But it’s up to the current president.”
And Chama said it was unfortunate president Banda died at home. However, president Banda was receiving medical treatment from Dubai, having recently been discharged from hospital there as reported by Daily Revelation Media.
“When I heard that he died at his home I said what really happened? I couldn’t believe. We have the state of the art hospital at Maina Soko, probably there should have been a lot of coordination. Whether that signifies that we are not talking to one another, we are not checking up on one another, because that is a former president and when his condition was deteriorating people should have noticed and made sure that even his death should have been a decent passing on,” said Chama. “But who am I to speculate about how he passed on? I don’t know, but I was just thinking aloud that we lost the former president at his house. Very very unfortunate.”
Chama said he remembers president Banda as a mature man, who welcomed him to his home when he was a mere PF provincial chairman for Lusaka Province, shortly after the PF assumed power from the fourth Republican president.
He said the two even joked about the 2011 general elections.
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