Do Not Weep at His Funeral — You Mocked Him While He Lived”
Opinion | For Immediate Publication
They mocked his morning jogs.
They laughed when he exercised.
They ridiculed his walks, his social interactions, even the air he breathed.
They told him to stop — that a former president had no right to meet the people who still loved him. And when he refused to disappear, they turned the machinery of state against him.
President Edgar Chagwa Lungu, Zambia’s Sixth Republican President, did not die only in South Africa — he died slowly, piece by piece, at the hands of those who were meant to protect his dignity as a former Head of State.
This country — under the leadership of Mr. Hakainde Hichilema and the UPND administration — did not just oppose Mr. Lungu politically; they humiliated him personally. They barred his travel for medical care. They fired an airport official simply for allowing him to leave the country. They taunted him in Parliament, in public spaces, and in media commentaries.
The President himself, Mr. Hichilema, a man who once called Lungu “his brother,” led the charge of mockery with reckless sarcasm and disrespect. Is this what brotherhood looks like?
He was forbidden from greeting the very people who voted him into office. He was jeered at Heroes Stadium. He was chased away from funerals. He was labeled everything except what he was — a former Head of State, a husband, a father, a Zambian. And when he finally went silent, they suddenly found their tongues to speak praise. But no tribute will undo what was done.
Let it be made clear: the UPND government has no moral ground to stand on at this funeral.
Do not attend with crocodile tears. Do not approach the grave with hands that shoved him there. Mourn him from Community House, where you celebrated Bill 10’s collapse like hungry lions tearing apart a weakened animal — cheering over your conquest with Coke bottles raised high.
You rejoiced when he was declared ineligible to contest. You lit verbal fires around his home, and when he fell silent, you called it a win. Now that he has fallen forever, you scramble to rewrite history? We will not allow it.
The Zambian people are not fools. We saw the betrayal. We watched the persecution. We read the headlines designed to demean him. We listened as judgment after judgment sought to erase him from the political landscape. And now, you want to give him a hero’s farewell?
No.
Let the nation remember the truth: Edgar Chagwa Lungu was a man many tried to destroy while he breathed. He forgave more than he retaliated. He walked with the people, even when it cost him his peace. He lived with grace, and now he rests with honor.
To those in power: your day will come. Your legacy will be written not by your speeches, but by your humanity — or the lack of it. And history will judge you without mercy.
Let this be a lesson: we must choose love over revenge, respect over rivalry, and truth over propaganda — while we are still alive.
Because no amount of wailing at the grave will cleanse a heart full of hate.
By Michael Zephaniah Phir i- Political Activist
