POLICE RAID SABOI IMBOELA’S HOUSE
…says they were plotting to arrest her so she could spend a night in police cells
POLICE officers yesterday raided National Democratic Congress (NDC) president Saboi Imboela’s house with an intention of arresting her for unknown reasons despite her being scheduled to appear before the police at Force Headquarters on Tuesday next week.
Ms Imboela in an interview said that a battalion of the police arrived at her home where they were hooting and threatened to break the gate if she did not present herself before them.
She said she did not understand why the police raided her house when they had agreed that she would present herself next Tuesday.
Ms Imboela said the plan was to have her spend the weekend in cells and vowed that she was not going to allow the police to act lawlessly and threaten her life and infringe on her rights. Ms Imbela, who in the recent past has had bad blood with the police however said the impunity the police were exhibiting was a threat to the rule of law and that it had become clear that the Zambia Police Service had become an appendage of the party in government.
She said she had become a victim of State machinations and that her harassment by state agents was but extrajudicial and for reasons that were more political than the transgression of the law.
“The police have been hooting for the past two hours but one thing I can tell you is that I am not going to allow them come to my house and harass me. I will let them break the gate if they can. I am scheduled to appear before the police next week in Tuesday and what would they be doing at my house on a Friday. They certainly have manufactured some case and would want me to spend a weekend in police cells. They said they would teach me a lesson that my mother did not teach me and now they are at my house,” Ms Imboela said.
She said the police were terrifying her children who were in the house due to the harassment as they were using force.
Ms Imboela said she had travelled to Kabompo and was forced to come back to Lusaka so that she could appear but was shocked that the police decided to storm her house despite agreeing on a new date. She said this was pure police brutality as the police were overstepping their boundaries and were being used to fight political battles.
“As far as I’m concerned I will only avail myself on Tuesday because that is the date they told me to report and I will to succumb to such kind of