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Thugs beat MP near police station
By
Joseph Langa - 30-07-2002 |
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Kasungu Southeast MP Kizito Ngwembe (MCP) was on Sunday beaten up by some 40 youths near Kasungu Police station.
Ngwembe said yesterday he was discussing with a police officer on duty the postponement of a political rally he and six other MPs were supposed to address at Bua Trading Centre when the youths, believed to be UDF young democrats, came and started beating him up.
According to the MP, the youths armed with wooden planks and metal rods, started beating him up at the counter of the police station after being identified by their leader, UDF district chair for the youth Sam Zimba in the presence of two police officers.
“I was at the counter explaining to the officer on duty on what we had decided on the meeting when Zimba came with over 40 boys I normally see in Kasungu market.
“Zimba identified me to the gang and they grabbed me by the neck and started beating me. I guess I fainted because the next thing I saw was that I was in a police cell,” said Ngwembe from Lilongwe Central Hospital where he was being treated as an outpatient yesterday.
On Sunday he was admitted to Kasungu District Hospital with bruises, according to clinical superintendent Albert Mbowe.
UDF district governor for Kasungu Daudi Kananji, while denying involvement in the violence, confirmed that the gang which vandalised a platform at the proposed venue of the postponed meeting at Bua used his vehicle.
“I just saw that the MCP have damaged our vehicle and we have reported this to police. I wasn’t involved but I know that some people in our party were provoked by the MPs by trying to hold a meeting stopped by the police,” he said.
In March last year, Zimba allegedly also led a team of young democrats who wreaked havoc at the same police station and are facing four charges of committing an act with intent to kill or injure, malicious damage, assaulting a police officer and disorderly conduct at police premises in the run-up to two by-elections in August, 2000.
He and two others are on bail.
Police Commissioner for Central Region Hudson Nyirenda, who rushed to Kasungu soon after the incident, said Ngwembe’s version contradicted what he was told by the officer-in-charge of Kasungu Police.
“I need to verify this because we are still investigating the matter. But the earlier information I got from the officer-in-charge from Kasungu was that they were beating him at the gate while the MP himself has told me that he was beaten right inside the police premises,” said Nyirenda.
Nyirenda, who said he saw the assaulted MP at Kasungu District Hospital, said no-one has been arrested so far and police are still probing the matter.
“We have sent the regional investigations officer to probe the matter to find out who was really behind it before we can arrest suspects over both the beating and the alleged vandalism at Bua,” he said, adding that no arrest was made at the scene because there was only one officer on duty.
UDF Deputy Publicity Secretary Ken Lipenga expressed ignorance on the matter and the alleged involvement of UDF young democrats, saying the party does not condone violence.
But Lipenga said if some young democrats were indeed involved in such violence then they did it in their personal capacity and contrary to the party’s policies. |
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