PRESS STATEMENT - ABZ 24th July 2013. CHANGE OF STRATEGY FOR THE LAUNCH OF ALLIANCE FOR BETTER ZAMBIA (ABZ) We wish to inform our party members and the general public that the Police Force (PF) in Kitwe has asked us not to go ahead with the public launch of our party this weekend on 27th July 2013. The politically motivated reason they have given is that police officers will be in Kafulafuta for the parliamentary by-election on 25th July 2013. However, we have decided not to go ahead with the launch because we have reliable information of plans by some senior members of a named political party to sponsor thugs and ex-prisoners to disrupt our public launch. Their plan is to target helpless women and children and severely beat them up to instill fear so that people would shun future meetings of our party. Since our party values human life, peace and social order we have decided to comply with the Police Force (PF) and postpone our public launch. We don’t want any of our members and supporters to shed blood on a day that they should shed tears of joy. We don’t want to have a bloody launch. We believe that time is coming soon when we shall be able to enjoy freedom of assembly and expression. We urge our members to remain calm and not look at this unfortunate development as a setback but as a pothole that we should carefully avoid and drive on. More such potholes should be expected but we shall conquer. Our party offers sincere apologies for the inconvenience this may cause. Frank Bwalya (Fr.) ABZ LEADER
Posted on: Wed, 24 Jul 2013 12:30:53 +0000