State House defends Banda apprehension, says fugitive will face justice

STATE House has defended the apprehension of former Petauke Member of Parliament Emmanuel Jay Banda, saying he will be presented before a competent court to answer the charges he faces.

In a statement, State House Communications Specialist Clayson Hamasaka said Banda will be afforded medical care, access to legal counsel and his family, and all rights guaranteed by the Constitution.

“Justice will be administered in accordance with the law,” Hamasaka said.

Hamasaka was responding to a joint statement issued by a group of local and regional civil society organizations on Banda’s apprehension.

He said the civil society statement contained a fundamental contradiction that its authors needed to address, noting that it expressly stated that it was not declaring the apprehension unlawful, yet concluded by calling upon the international community to condemn “these acts of lawlessness.”

“That is a verdict that precedes evidence,” Hamasaka said.

“Civil society is entitled to demand transparency. Its credibility, however, depends on applying to its own conclusions the same rigour it demands of Government,” he said.

Hamasaka said it was only bogus organizations that could question the apprehension of a suspect who made a public call for the assassination of a democratically elected head of state and for the genocidal annihilation of the ethnic group from which the president hails.

“No genuine human rights defender can excuse such incitement and remain credible,” he said.

Hamasaka said while the government appreciated that civil society organizations needed to justify continued funding from their financiers, there was a moral way of sourcing money.

“Human rights advocacy cannot be reduced to a commercial enterprise in which outrage is manufactured for sale to the highest bidder,” he said.

He said describing Banda’s broadcasts as merely “vulgar” was wholly inadequate.

Hamasaka said Zambia was a sovereign state governed by the Constitution and the rule of law, adding that a fugitive did not acquire immunity by crossing a border.

“Cooperation between sovereign states in securing the return of wanted persons to face justice is a legitimate exercise of sovereign responsibility and mutual legal assistance,” he said.

“Those who seek to turn a fugitive into a victim and a law enforcement operation into lawlessness should reflect deeply on whose human rights they truly serve,” Hamasaka said.

(Mwebantu, Tuesday, 20th October, 2026)