A source tells Zambia Reports that owner and editor of the Post Newspapers Fred M’membe did not sleep at his home on Nangwenya road on the night that Justice Minister Wynter Kabimba was fired. Given the aggressive publications he has made in recent days – including an article that suggested that his former ally President Michael Sata was not well enough to carry out presidential duties – it makes sense why he may have chosen to hide.
M’membe’s fears that security agents would pounce on him regarding the alleged leaked top secret letter from Finance Minister Alexander Chikwanda were well founded – days later the OP raided both the homes of Wynter Kabimba and press secretary George Chellah.
A source at the Post Newspaper has revealed that M’membe was so confused and appeared scared when news broke that Kabimba had been dismissed.
“He started pacing around uttering some words to himself while also trying to make some phone calls,” the source said. “I have never seen our boss in such a state all the years I have been with the Post. I can tell you that day he was really panicking,” the source added.
According to the source, M’membe was later that evening heard telling Bivan Saluseki, the managing editor, that “crushing somewhere else would be the best option” to which Saluseki nodded in agreement. It is these words that convinced the source that M’membe and maybe even Saluseki did not sleep at their respective homes on Thursday August 28, 2014. The source reveals that on Friday August 29, 2014 he checked with a few other people who normally do some errands to and from M’membe’s Nangwenya road residence and he established that what he suspected was actually what happened.
“M’membe appears to come out brave when in fact he is one big coward, so scared of anything that smells like a police or prison cell. Like he did many years back when he was found in contempt of Parliament he may go into hiding especially that he knows the kind of person the man he now simply calls Michael is,” the source says.
With the leaked top secret letter which has since been declassified, the source says that M’membe knows that it may not be long before he is visited by the police.
Much as journalism demands that you do not reveal your sources of information, it is clear that sooner rather ran later he will be visited by state agents because apparently Sata thinks M’membe has gone too far especially after being warned in the early days of the PF regime to stop getting unauthorized documents and information from Cabinet Office and other government offices.
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