By Chimwemwe Mwanza
If ever you were in doubt about how inept our police service is, you need not read beyond Pamela Chisumpa and the sequel leading to her abduction and eventual rescue. For once, can the police admit without scapegoating that the Chisumpa debacle has not only exposed their incompetence but caught them napping too.
Say what you may, events of this week are making it harder to escape the conclusion that the police service whose function is to secure our confines has become complicity, if not a willing participant, in the lawlessness afflicting the country. It can’t be that their only record of success so far is their habitual incarceration of the likes of Chilufya Tayali and a coterie of usual political jail birds, Sean Tembo and Raphael Nakachinda among other hapless individuals.
Truth is the police has deeply intwined itself in partisan warfare to the extent that it’s been reduced to a pitbull whose job is to snap at the heels of opposition politicians. And the ramification of this status quo is telling in their priorities. Do they allocate sufficient resources in protecting vulnerable communities and law-abiding citizens or focus their attention on barking and chasing after those they perceive to be enemies of the state – while leaving criminals such as abduction kingpins James Bwalya and Matthews Sikaonga to roam our streets with gay abandon?
As Lusaka lawyer – that prolific writer Sakwiba Sikota tacitly put it in his tribute to the superheroes that rescued Chisumpa and her fellow 12 captives, the Zambian girl child is now at her most vulnerable – left on her own to protect herself from possible human traffickers, pedophiles and rapists prowling our communities for their next victims. Difficult as it is to comprehend this reality, fact is that this country has not only become a transit point but is a haven for human trafficking syndicates keen to exploit our porous borders and a politically compromised policing system.
Forget the fact that this kidnaping episode and the subsequent rescue of the 13 girls from the now infamous Chalala house has thrust Zambia onto the international limelight – albeit for the wrong reasons, question is do we have a crime intelligence network that is capable of combating or detect human trafficking and other sophisticated crimes? If we do, how did we then find ourselves in this extraordinary circumstance in which our men in uniform failed to crack an embarrassing and child-like drama unfolding right under our noses?
And the audacity of lies – ati iyayi, we were one day away from raiding that house but were beaten to our plans by the bravery and heroic acts of the community. Apa peve mwami ba Lemmy Kajoba mwayitaya. Mwenze muna gona pa nchito – not for one day but an entire six months. If anything the major lesson from this episode is that civil society has to mobilise to ensure that the police is eventually detached from the clutches of this government and its politics.
Why Chisumpa is a person of interest in her own kidnapping
While important to empathise with Chisumpa and her fellow abductees, we should not shy from asking the most difficult questions in our quest to crack this bizarre case – after all facts don’t care about feelings. Already, there is a hair-tearing oddity to this case – the familiarity of the abductors to the alleged victims.
Is it possible that Chisumpa assisted by James Bwalya could have faked her own kidnapping so she could deprive her employers off their cashing from the Airtel money transaction business she was tasked with managing? How many of the 13 victims were managing similar Airtel money transaction businesses? Other than Chisumpa, did the rest of the victims know their abductors, particularly Bwalya?
Most important, could this entire kidnapping sequel pass off as one of those poker games that went horribly wrong? For many a speculator, Bwalya’s familiarity and proximity to his victims presage the assumption that nearly all the kidnap victims were in this game for the long haul. Think of it this way, how is it possible that all these women could have been held captive in such a tiny house for half a year and against their will? Honestly, the assumption that all the women in the house were genuine kidnap victims, beggars belief.
However hard it is proving to extract the truth of this situation, law enforcement officers should not relent. Sympathy aside, police have an easy route to redemption. How so? Land a few hot claps on Chisumpa’s malnourished cheeks, and she will sing like a cannery. It can’t be that the entire citizenry had been combing the country for a missing individual only to stumble upon 12 other women – whom bizarrely were never reported anywhere as missing persons.
This hardly makes any sence. Chimo chine nokushita ichitumbuwa chimo elyo bakubikilapo imbasela 12.
About the Author: Mwanza enjoys reading Political History and Philosophy. For feedback, email [email protected]
