History
Hakainde Hichilema (born 4 June 1962) is a Zambian
businessman and
politician who has been President of the
United Party for National Development, an opposition political party, since 2006.
Hakainde Hichilema's arrest was widely condemned. The
United States,
[23] the
European Union[24] and the
European Parliament[25] denounced the arrest. The
Africa Liberal Network condemned the arrest as an attempt by President Lungu to silence dissent and opposition.
[26] The Catholic bishops strongly condemned the arrest and said Zambia had become a dictatorship under President Edgar Lungu.
[27] Julius Malema, the leader of South Africa's EFF party, accused Zambia's president Edgar Lungu of
apartheid style repression for detaining Hichilema on treason charges
[12] and called president Lungu a “Coward”.
[28] Mmusi Maimane, the leader of South Africa's DA party, who was denied entry into Zambia to visit Hichilema in Jail
[29] (stopped from exiting the plane at
Lusaka's
Kenneth Kaunda International Airport) strongly denounced the trumped up charges against Hichilema.
[30]
Time in jail
Hichilema said in an interview on HARDtalk that during his time in prison he was held in
solitary confinement for 8 days without food, water, light or visitation, was tortured by having his private parts pepper sprayed and accused president Lungu of having tried to kill him.
[31]
His wife Mutinta was turned away by prison officials when she took food for him.
Hichilema's arrest was the subject of the episode of
Al Jazeera's
The Stream TV program titled
Is Zambia's democracy in danger[32] which aired on 30 May 2017.
High-profile jail visitations
Zambia's first president
Kenneth Kaunda was turned away by prison officials when he visited Hichilema in Prison.
[33]
Mmusi Maimane, leader of the
Democratic Alliance (South Africa) was also turned away by
Zambia Police when he came to Zambia to attend Hichilema's court appearance, he was not allowed to disembark from the plane, had his phone confiscated and was roughed up.
[29] This prompted South Africa's Foreign Ministry to summon Zambia's Ambassador to South Africa Emmanuel Mwamba to explain the actions of the Zambian regime.
Former President of
Nigeria,
Olusegun Obasanjo visited Hichilema in Prison.
[34]
Secretary General of the
Commonwealth, Baroness
Patricia Scotland visited Hichilema in Prison twice.
[35]
2017
BBC World News Hardtalk Interview With Hakainde Hichilema.