PRESIDENT BANDA HAS NOT LOST ANY MONEY

PRESIDENT BANDA HAS NOT LOST ANY MONEY

We wish to refer to the lead story in today's edition of The Post newspaper under the headline “$36,000 goes missing in Rupiah’s bedroom” in which it is alleged that His Excellency Mr Rupiah Banda, the Fourth Republican President, had such an amount allegedly stolen from him.

We wish to categorically state that no such kind of money has ever gone missing from the President’s New Kasama house in recent times. The story in The Post newspaper is a total fabrication by the authors.

President Banda has also never reported or sent any agent to any police station to report any such kind of missing money. In any case, President Banda’s house is guarded by State security who should have been the first ones to be informed if any money had missing at the residence.

How ironic it is to have the case reported at Woodlands police station without the knowledge of the President’s bodyguards and indeed the VIP protection unit stationed at his house!

 We demand that, in the spirit of responsible journalism The Post retract the story and apologise to the President and the nation for misleading them with such blatant lies.

Journalists can verify with Woodlands police station or indeed any police station to ascertain the truth whether about whether such a report was ever reported by President Banda or indeed any of his agents.

Finally, we also wish to clarify the erroneous caption on the front page picture of today’s edition of The Post stating that President Banda lives in his personal house in New Kasama.

The said house is a private property rented by the Zambian Government on behalf of the former President as per his retirement benefits.

President Banda does not own that house as portrayed by The Post newspaper. The Zambian government is yet to build a house for President Banda.

Issued by the office of the Fourth Republican President