NYIRENDA’S DEATH
GOVERNMENT must demand for an official explanation from the Russian government how a Zambian student serving a prison term ended up at the war front in the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine.
The 23-year-old Nyirenda had gone to Russia to study nuclear engineering but he was serving a jail sentence – for a drugs-related charge, at the time of his death.
Zambia has rightly called for answers from Moscow on how the student ended up being killed in a battlefield in Ukraine – in defence of Russia.
Russia previously notified Zambia that Lemekhani Nyirenda had been killed on the battlefield in Ukraine in September, prompting the Zambian government to ask Moscow for more details and an explanation of how he had ended up fighting in the wa.r
It is not just Nyirenda’s family that is seeking answers but all Zambians want to know what really happened to him.
The Russian government must explain how Nyirenda was released from prison where he was serving time, was freed and found himself at the war front.
His family does not know how he was conscripted or by whom.
It was reported from Moscow yesterday that a Russian businessman, Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close ally of President Vladimir Putin, confirmed that Nyirenda had been fighting for his Wagner Private Military Group.
Prigozhin’s Concord catering group said Nyirenda had been recruited by Wagner. Prigozhin and other Wagner representatives have toured Russian prisons offering amnesty in return for signing up to fight for Russia in Ukraine.
That private security organisations can enter government prisons to recruit inmates to sign up to fight in the Ukraine for Russia raises a lot of questions which the Russian government must answer.
We find it strange that Russia could let foreigners serving in its prisons to be sent to fight in a war in which they had no interest, taking advantage of their vulnerability.
We do not think Nyirenda or any other prisoners who were recruited were in a position to negotiate given that they were in a weaker position.
They took advantage of his precarious situation – serving a prison term in foreign country and dangled the prospects of freedom by enlisting in a mercenary force that led to his death for a cause he never fully believed in.
And the mere fact that the Zambian embassy in Moscow was not aware of one of its citizens fighting in Ukraine raises moral issues for the Russian government.
This is a war which the Zambian government has condemned and supported the international community’s call for the two sides to cease hostilities.
Zambia has called for dialogue between the two warring sides.
Zambia has been against the Russian invasion of Ukraine and has not hidden this fact, siding with the majority at the United Nations to condemn the war.
It is in this vein that Zambians fail to understand how one of their own was inducted into a war that his government does not support.
We are not impressed that Yevgeny Prigozhin claims Nyirenda had died a “hero.” He should have been left alone in prison for he was never a military person.
Zambians demand answers.