Livingstone Member of Parliament Sakwiba Sikota, is concerned at alleged Police brutality in Livingstone.
Some members of the public, mostly employees of some private companies who work during night, have claimed to have allegedly been physically assaulted by some unnamed Police officers assigned to conduct night patrols in the tourist capital.
Mr Sikota regretted that some Police officers were allegedly abusing their authority by engaging in unprofessional conduct as they execute the duty of reversing the crime wave in the city.
He was reacting to claims of physical abuse made by some Sun International hotel employees, who stormed ZANIS offices in Livingstone and alleged that they were beaten by some police officers on their way from work.
Mr Sikota advised the Police to bear in mind that it was inevitable for some workers to move during night time considering that most businesses were tourism based and operated both during day and night time.
He has since appealed to Inspector General of Police, Ephraim Mateyo, to ensure that paramilitary officers deployed to
Livingstone are oriented to target criminals and not innocent people.
He said this in a telephone interview with ZANIS in Livingstone today.
Meanwhile, Southern Province Police Commanding Officer, Lemmy Kajoba, said he had not received reports of alleged Police brutality in Livingstone.
Mr. Kajoba said the crime wave reported in Livingstone was more pronounced in the media than on the ground and added that no one had been beaten since paramilitary officers begun patrols in the city last week.
Let the officers work in peace please. I do remember nicely in the days of KK when my dad was working till late for an Italian restaurant, he was issued a card by the police, that he always produced to the police whenever he came across them at night and he had never experienced any problems. Members of the communities should work with gov to make life easy for the police officers. don’t just criticize
Let find an amicable solution to the Livingstone issue. It is a very simple issue. The other is the one alluded to as above of using ID cards. We are all Zambians and fighting for the development of mother Zambia.
# 1 walasa. Bachimbwi aba shud no jst critise for the sake of it. Ba silikali all the way from Lusaka spend sleepless nites in Libingi in an bid to bring crime levels down, while bachimbwi bayanzika marete in peace, and the next day they woke up to critise. What the nonsense. What does Sakwiba mean by the police to get oriented and target criminals not the innocent? Does’nt he know that criminals may masquerade as employees for sun hotel? Or he wants police to come in after criminals attack? This is excvatly what was obtaining in Kabwe. FYI, Basilikali aba are putting in they best to save the turist capital that you’ve failed for as little as K600 pin p/month. Learn to appreciate *****s.
#3- bachimbwi bayanzika….!!! Lol
Sikota is just a cruede politician who want to political mileage over the un found case. Paramilitaries are hard work force to reckon with and they work under difficult conditions that if it was the other police wings the media will be writing about. Let the men in uniform do thier job as they are known for.Sakwiba I wish I was a paramilitary officer so that I wipe your fat annus. Livingstone is becoming a no go area. VIVA popa boys clean the tourist city for the best of our economy and peace. we are behind you. parapara fi fit. we love you
Sikota is just a cruede politician who want to make political mileage over the un found case. If he is caring and understanding, he would have spoken to Kajoba and not rushing to the media shame. Paramilitaries are hard working force to reckon with and they work under difficult conditions that if it was the other police wings the media will be writing about. Let the men in uniform do their job as they are known for.Sakwiba I wish I was a paramilitary officer so that I can wipe your fat anus. Livingstone is becoming a no go area. VIVA popa boys clean the tourist city for the best of our economy and peace. in two few days lstone will quiet. we are behind you. parapara fi fit. we love you
Myself I’m still happy with the Zambian Police. they earn peanuts but they still patrol the nation on foot at night. I think anyone should be appreciative for this… here in South Africa, the richest sub-saharan nation, cops can only patrol on foot daylight and only to harass foreigners, at night a woman can be raped just across your street and there’s nothing the thugs can fear and the cops can only show up after 2 hours or so.
Iwe sikota you are a lawyer who knows all the criminal procedures.How can you just go to the media and complain without any proof nonsense.The police are working under very difficult conditions getting six hundred zali per month which you just spend in a day at nandos.You are there complaining instead of fighting for salary increments foolish man.Your car was stollen and through the hard work of our men in uniform it was recovered but next time watchout.
#1 Good point, Sakwiba is still living in the 70’s where he thinks it is not his duty to provide alternative advice. why cant he suggest to the police to have a system of enabling these people who work late to have freedom of movement. These same people if one of them was killed they would be the same people shouting that the police are not doing enough. Policemen ladies and gentlemen are good people, the few times I had intercted with them they have been very nice. So #1 let us go with your suggestion!!!
Myself do blame Sun Hotels. I worked there and workers are not taken to their respective compounds but just dropped at the main Post Office in town…. imagine that is 23:00hrs. The police are correct coz if they give SIZ workers a waiver, am sure all criminals will suddenly pose as SIZ workers. Guys, Instead of beating them just keep them in safe custody until maybe 05hrs in the morning.
Sikota should be ashamed of himsself if has any sense left in himself at all. He is just a chancer!!!!!!
Bravo Buchus, beat the hell out of those villagers.
If Kajoba is saying the crime wave reported in Livingstone is more pronounced in the media than it is on the ground why did he allow the paramilitary police to be deployed in the town? Surely it is because Livingstone police failed to contain the situation. And this has reflected badly on him and the rest of the Livingstone police command.The laissez-faire attitude that has hit every section of the Zambian society is worrisome. What does Sikota expect when the Paramilitary are called in? They are a paramilitary force not a bunch of jokers.
#10, i do not agree with u that sun hotel must provide a taxi service for the workers. Sun operates a hotel and not transport infrastructure in the city. The same sakwiba’s govt should invest in descent commuter transport (the way united bus company of zambia used to be) to provide even late night service to workers in busy cities to accommodate late night workers if they are serious about tourism. If they think they can’t run these commuter buses they should then frenchise the routes to various private operators, but with strict outlines on how to run the buses and standards. T make it even safer for commuters, paired policemen should always be on these buses. Equally important, our…
…police force should be beefed up with adequate transport and up-to-date technology for night patrols especially in tourist towns. These way tourists and workers alike may feel some sense of security. you cannot restrict a tourist to a day’s movement only. A tourist wants to enjoy him/her self at any given time. Thats why they are on holiday, anyway.
Well,police brutality,that could only come about becoz ther’s no cooperation form residents.too bad but we need to rtealise that these guys are working under very stressful and bad conditions.let’s help them reduce crime.
Bantu bantu please, as much as the police have to do their work, we can not ignore the conditions that our police men work under. This means that these guys will use any means to supplement their meager salaries and in so doing break the law themselves.
I remember back in the day when I wa a Lusaka resident and we would go on neighborhood watch patrols with our police, god it was a sham, they would virtually harass law abiding citizens for no reason. As a trained policeman, one has to have sense of judgement. a citizen going home is different from one loitering and there is a case when we found one such gentleman 30 meters from his house and the policeman refused him entry to his house.
Pliz, pliz #1. We cannot go back to the time of using pass tickets. In what century are we? Let people move about freely and let the buma professionally identify those who are causing problems. By the way, under no circumstances should a police officer use his shambok.
Who expects paraparas to behave like human rights police …. those chaps mean business and its good to instil fear in these stupid chaps who just want to loiter at 00.00 instead of making babies with their wifes at home….They should have a permanent camp in stone and rotate them…they are a true reinvention of ba BA MOBILE…