 Good afternoon members of the press and welcome to this very very short briefing from here in Kassam and Northern Provinces. I want to say that I'm extremely disappointed by what is obtaining in the police service. When President Hagainde Ichilema came into office he made very important statements that we all believed that the rule of law was now going to be respected. One of the statements that he issued was the effect that any Zambian and I mean any Zambian who is arrested for whatever charge as long as that charge is bailable or bondable must be given police bond before 48 hours as stipulated by law. We were all very very happy that now the Zambia police was getting reformed and that the rule of law was now going to be respected. Suffice to state that I have been a victim of police political persecution where I was arrested 12 times charged with nine trumped up criminal charges and every time I was arrested I was kept in police custody without police bond. The longest time I was given I was kept in police custody without police bond was about nine days without being taken to court without being given police bond and on all the nine 12 times that I was arrested I was never given a police bond from the police. I would be kept in police custody and I would go and apply for bail at the court and in one of the court cases Magistrate Muali who was then President Magistrate even indicated that why didn't you give him police bond this is a straightforward matter the police had no explanation at all. So when President Agai in the HLMA came and said every Zambian is entitled to police bond is entitled to bail and told the police before you arrest somebody you must investigate when you arrest you immediately give a police bond. What is happening now is disheartening and I want the international community to know that what President Agai in the HLMA told the whole world is a total lie is an excellent lie. What is going what is happening is something else. You will see the story of Chama Davis Chama the former Secretary General of PF. He was kept in detention for 11 days. Look at my younger brother a campyonga was put in detention for close to seven days. Here in Kasama we have just come from the police to visit one PF cadre by the name of Chama. It's popular known as Chama America. This young man on Friday cadre of UPND abducted him. Countrymen and women abducted him. They went and locked him up at some house he didn't know for about eight hours. They beat him up and they told him that if he gave them 10,000 kwacha they were going to release him and not to hand him over to the police where is going to to stay in detention for a long time. They actually called me to say that if you send 10,000 we are going to release him. I told them I cannot do that because one you are committing an offense of extortion. Two you are committing an offense of blackmail. Three you have abducted that person. Abduction is a serious offense and four you've assorted that young man. The video of them beating him up went viral. Everybody saw they beat him so badly and they took him to the police station to go and report that reported criminal had committed some crimes in the past. I personally spoke to the officer in charge Lusaka Central Police and I said how can you arrest somebody who has been beaten, somebody who has been abducted, somebody who people are trying to extort money from and I explained to him what had transpired. He assured me that the issue was going to be resolved. They got him out of the cells, gave him a medical report for the beatings that he had suffered and he went to the hospital. When he went to the hospital and came back with a signed medical report indicating that the man was assorted. UP ND cadres came to the police and started shouting. The police you turned. Instead of arresting those people who had abducted him, who were trying to extort money from him, who had beaten him, they locked up this young man called Chama America and charged him with an offense that he committed an offense in 2015 that they had beaten somebody. They forgot about the beating that he had been inflicted. They forgot about the medical report that he had come with. They forgot about the abduction and they locked him up from Friday. The man has been in detention over a simple case of assault that they charged him without paying attention to the report that he had taken to the police. President Haga Indayichilema, my brother, you and I went through this kind of treatment by the police. I don't expect that you'd allow other Zambians to go through what you went through. Leadership entails that if pain had been inflicted on you, you don't want to see other people being treated in a similar manner. I want to tell you that if I were you, I would not allow any Zambian to be treated the way you and I were treated. And if you're accepting these things to be done under your nose, these things to be turned to Zambians under your leadership, then my dear brother, I doubt your leadership. I very much doubt your leadership. And you see, leadership entails that every statement you say must have integrated. There is no way the president can issue a statement that whoever you arrest says he must be investigated when you arrest give police bond if a matter is bondable. Today over a simple case of assault, a man is languishing in prison from Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday. Today is Tuesday. He has not been given police bond. He has not been taken to court. What do you call that? Extra judicial punishment. Because when you keep somebody in detention without the pronouncement from the court that is guilty on an offence and sentenced, that is extrajudicial punishment. I want to appeal to you, my brother, that this is why Zambian people complained about PF. And this is what you want to do. I can tell you, my brother, that your days in that office are numbered. Your days in that office are numbered. I'm advising you without malice that please make sure these issues stop. These issues must come to an end. When a Zambian is arrested of any allegation, please treat them in accordance with the law. And if you go to see this young man in prison, is limping, is swollen, is literally shivering because he was beaten very badly. And the police have refused to send him to the hospital. This is unacceptable. We are reliably informed that they've just been given an instruction to keep him as long as they can. And they are now giving an excuse that no, we took the docket to the prosecutor's offices for them to take him to court. Surely, should we continue on this trajectory as a country? Because do and to others what you want to do, what you want others to do and to you. The same way you are treating the people, you also be treated the same way. If this issue is not brought to a complete stop, we had a lot of hope. I personally believed in your statement because you and I, you were arrested about 15 times. I was arrested about 12 times. What you went through, surely my brother, you want others to go through it. That's not leadership. I'm appealing to you from a brother to a brother. Please tell the police at Kasama to either take that man to court tomorrow morning so that he can apply for bail if they don't want to give him police bond or let him give him police bond today without fail because this is unacceptable. This is not the rule of law that you promised the people of Zambia and the international community. You are saying for now you can criticize government without looking on to your shoulders. But I doubt. We are just hearing today that one of your MPs has gone to report Honore Bonacachinda to the police for simply expressing his views over a certain matter. So what do you mean when you said what used to happen in PAF will never happen here? This is exactly what was happening. Can we change Zambia for better? Zambia deserves better than this kind of situation that we are seeing now. It's very unfortunate that a man accused to have committed assault can remain in detention for five days without a police bond, without being taken to court. This is not what the youth of Zambia voted for. Can this issue be sorted out? Thank you.