Zambians will not be fooled. They are now able to read in between the lines and see through the trickery and dealings that have become the order of the day in the manner that the country is being governed. There is something that makes the Patriotic Front under the leadership of Mr. Edgar Lungu similar to the MMD under the leadership of Rupiah Banda. It is the pattern of corruption, fights and persecutions that are being carried out. For many who have long asserted Rupiah Banda’s leveraged position in this government’ set up, this similarity certainly gives credence to their argument. Former President Rupiah Banda is widely known to hate certain people, for one reason or another. He is also known to have worked to fix such people using state power when he briefly served as president following the demise of President Mwanawasa. We have started to see the manifestation of this behavior under the PF. In clear terms, the RB and Edgar Lungu working relationship must be responsible for this similarity. For example, the humiliation and persecution that Dr. Rajan Mahtani has been subjected to says a lot about these similarities that we see between the MMD government under Rupiah Banda and PF, under Mr. Edgar Lungu. If a little is all one has, then we will tell you that it only requires a little intelligence for one to see that even dead cases which were closed are being brought back to settle scores on behalf of Rupiah Banda. All the tricks that have been played around the ridiculous forgery case against Mahtani say a lot about the power that Mr. Rupiah Banda enjoys in the PF and government corridors of power. Now, it appears that this Mahtani forgery case may gravely embarrass them after all. For starters, the High Court recently granted Mahtani leave to commence judicial review proceedings against the said prosecution. There was a nolle and further, an Undertaking by the Attorney General that this matter would never be pursued at any time. How Banda prevailed on the State and have them act contrary to an Undertaking that has legal effect is difficult to fathom. This excessive Banda influence is bound to cause political harm to the PF and Mr. Lungu as president. Decency and morality seem to have no place in the way that the PF under Edgar Lungu is running. And this is the typical RB style of doing things. What about those Ventriglia criminals who pose as business people, what has changed about the threat that they pose to this country? They were deported by Edgar Lungu when he served as Home affairs Minister, why have they been allowed to come back and wreak havoc to an investment that is not fully theirs? It is sickening that Rupiah Banda’s predominance in this government is being allowed to cause enormous damage to people that add value to this country. And Mahtani is one such a person. Just because of Banda’s connections, all the wrongs being committed by the Ventriglias are being ignored. It’s as if law enforcement does not exist. As an organization, we know that it was Lungu who signed an order of deportation for the Danielle Ventriglia and Valerio Ventriglia after a long investigation that the Ventriglia family was externalizing huge sums of money to Italy. From our understanding these people were supposed to be arrested for charges like money laundering, but today they are back in the Country and they are once again friends of the powers that be, it is completely ridiculous. It is a well known fact that the Ventriglia family was committing and continues to commit diverse crimes, but it seems nothing will be done about it under this government. The point is what we have come across in our own investigation. They have a close associate in RB who in turn has a close associate in President Lungu.
Gavin Sinkala
Agenda against Corruption in Zambia (ACOZA)
gavinsinkala@gmail.com
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Edgar Lungu should tell Zambians what has changed about his position on the Italian Mafia Ventriglias after he deported them.
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