Human Rights ‘Drastically Deteriorated’ Under President Lungu - Amnesty International
The worldwide human rights organisation Amnesty International has accused President Lungu’s government of facilitating an “increasingly brutal crackdown on human rights” in the last five years. The NGO says this rising authoritarianism has been characterised by attacks on opposition parties, restrictions on freedom of expression and an increase in police and extrajudicial killings.
Amnesty’s Director for East and Southern Africa, Deprose Muchena, observed that, “The human rights situation has drastically deteriorated under Lungu’s presidency.” He added, “What we have seen in Zambia, especially in the past five years, is an increasingly brutal crackdown on human rights characterised by brazen attacks on any form of dissent”.
His comments come in the wake of a new report published by the NGO entitled ‘Ruling by fear and repression’, which documents the deterioration of Zambia’s human rights record over the past five years and outlines how censorship, excessive use of force by police, arbitrary arrests and detention have created “a climate of fear and impunity”.
In particular the report criticises the restrictions placed on opposition parties and their leaders, which it says have grown more severe during the Covid-19 pandemic.
It highlights the arbitrary arrest of United Progressive Party leader Saviour Chishimba in 2017 for criticising the government’s decision to invoke a state of emergency following a string of arson attacks in Lusaka. Similarly, Amnesty condemns the treatment of Patriots for Economic Progress president Sean Tembo, who was also arrested on charges of defamation for questioning the purchase of a $400 million presidential jet.
This criticism comes barely a week after the Christian Churches Monitoring Group issued a statement saying that the police had been disproportionately disrupting meetings held by the United Party for National Development, compared to those held by the Patriotic Front.
Amnesty International’s report further bemoans the restrictions placed on independent media houses by the PF government. It cites the closure of The Post in 2016 and the revocation of Prime TV’s broadcasting licence in 2020 as two examples of the Lungu regime’s blatant censorship.
The report describes this as part of a “systematic erosion to the right to freedom of expression” over the past five years. It again chimes with a recent statement by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), which calls on the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) to stop harassing Muvi TV and to ensure the independence of media ahead of August’s upcoming elections.
CPJ have alleged that IBA’s threat to revoke Muvi’s broadcasting licence is tantamount to state censorship.
Finally, the Amnesty report notes with concern the increasing levels of police violence, which has largely been directed against opposition party supporters over the past five years.
In particular it cites the brutal scenes outside Police HQ on 22 December 2020, when citizens who had gathered to support UPND leader Hakainde Hichilema were shot at by the police. The attack resulted in the deaths of two citizens: Joseph Kaunda, a UPND supporter, and Nsama Nsama, a state prosecutor who was not even part of the gathering and was buying a meal at a nearby restaurant.
The report further highlights the tragic death of Vesper Shumuzhila, an UNZA student who died in 2018 when police threw a tear gas canister into her room during the violent dispersal of a student protest. The officer responsible has still not been charged.
Overall the report is incredibly damning of the PF government’s human rights record and calls on the authorities to “commit to respecting, protecting, promoting and ensuring full respect for human rights before, during and after the 12 August election.
Mr Muchena says the government must also “end impunity for past human rights violations” as well as ensure the rights of freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly for all Zambians.