The Editor Zambia
As usual, Sishuwa Sishuwa’s latest intervention, titled “The Quest for a Life Presidency: How Hichilema Plans to Destroy the Opposition,” is presented as political analysis, but reads less like sober scholarship and more like an elaborate political indictment constructed almost entirely from allegations, anonymous sources, assumptions and conclusions that are presented as established facts.
The central problem with Sishuwa’s article is not that he criticises President Hakainde Hichilema since democratic societies need robust criticism of those in power, the problem is that the author repeatedly makes extraordinary allegations without producing evidence capable of sustaining them. 
He does not merely allege that the election was flawed but declares that President Hichilema “stole” it and worse, he does not merely question the circumstances surrounding the security operation in Kabulonga.
He condescendingly declares as he always does that the government fabricated the entire militia story.
The South African based Zambian don does not merely ask whether due process was followed but arrogantly asserts that the President ordered abductions, manipulated election results, orchestrated arrests, concealed a death, planned mass detentions, intended to manufacture evidence and was preparing to capture the opposition.
These are not minor accusations but allegations of extraordinary criminal and constitutional wrongdoing that ordinarily require extraordinary evidence.
Instead, the article repeatedly relies on unnamed “government insiders,” “well-placed sources,” “hospital sources” and individuals supposedly close to security services.
The reader is asked to accept their claims without knowing who they are, what their positions are, what evidence they possess, or whether their accounts have been independently corroborated.
That is not investigative journalism at its strongest but hearsay elevated into political certainty.
Perhaps the most revealing feature of the article is the leap from unanswered questions to predetermined conclusions.
Sishuwa identifies inconsistencies in the government’s account and immediately treats those inconsistencies as proof that the entire operation was fabricated.
But a discrepancy in the timing of an operation does not, by itself, prove an attempted coup was invented.
Questions about a security operation do not establish that no weapons existed.
Questions about arrests do not establish that the people arrested were innocent.
Criticism of government communication does not constitute evidence that the President personally ordered an elaborate conspiracy.
A serious political analyst should distinguish between what is known, what is alleged, what is suspected, and what remains to be established.
Unfortunately, Sishuwa does the opposite.
The most astonishing leap is his claim that President Hichilema is preparing to become president for life. Where is the evidence? The article offers none. There is no constitutional amendment cited that would abolish presidential term limits.
There is no documented government policy proposing a life presidency, and there is no statement from President Hichilema advocating permanent rule.
Instead, the reader is asked to infer a lifetime-presidency project from alleged attacks on opposition figures.
That is political speculation masquerading as evidence. If it came from a Kaponya sharing ignorance with his peers in a bar, one would forgive such rantings. But coming from an education person like Sishuwa.
The article also attempts to portray the NRPUP as the established “main opposition” after supposedly winning 60 parliamentary seats. Yet even if that parliamentary claim is accepted, electoral strength does not automatically prove the existence of a government conspiracy to destroy the party.
A new opposition party emerging strongly after an election is precisely what competitive politics should produce. If the NRPUP believes the presidential election was stolen, the Constitution provides a legal mechanism for challenging the result. Sishuwa himself cites Article 103.
That raises an obvious question: Why devote so much energy to constructing a narrative of inevitable authoritarianism rather than allowing the opposition to marshal its evidence before the Constitutional Court?
The answer may be that the article is not really about establishing what happened but about establishing a narrative before the facts are tested.
The treatment of the alleged militia is equally problematic. Sishuwa correctly recognises that allegations of armed insurrection are serious and deserve scrutiny.
But instead of demanding an independent investigation, he simply declares the government’s account false and then constructs his own alternative account based on anonymous sources.
The article goes even further by making the extraordinary allegation that authorities are considering dissolving the body of Mutotwe Kafwaya in sulphuric acid or burying him in an unmarked grave.
This is perhaps the clearest example of how far the narrative has travelled from verifiable fact into sensational speculation.
There is another fundamental contradiction in Sishuwa’s argument. He accuses President Hichilema of being determined to destroy democratic institutions yet repeatedly portrays the opposition as an entirely passive victim while providing little serious examination of its own conduct.
Sishuwa’s argument ultimately rests on a circular proposition: President Hichilema is authoritarian and therefore everything the government says about the opposition must be fabricated; and because everything is allegedly fabricated, that proves President Hichilema is authoritarian.
That is not rigorous analysis. It is confirmation bias.
Most troublingly, Sishuwa’s article risks poisoning public discourse at precisely the moment when Zambia needs restraint. Calling a democratically elected president a thief, accusing the State of assassination and abduction, alleging fabricated evidence, predicting mass arrests, and declaring the entire electoral outcome fraudulent are not innocent rhetorical flourishes. They can deepen political distrust and make peaceful constitutional dispute more difficult.
Zambia does not need political prophets predicting dictatorship from every government action. It needs citizens, journalists, academics, and political leaders willing to separate facts from allegations.
Sishuwa is entitled to oppose President Hichilema. He is entitled to challenge the election. He is entitled to question the conduct of the security agencies. He is even entitled to argue that the government is becoming authoritarian.
But an academic reputation does not turn anonymous allegations into evidence. The real test now is simple: produce the evidence.
If the election was stolen, demonstrate precisely how. If people were abducted, identify the perpetrators and produce the evidence.
If Kafwaya was assassinated by State agents, produce the medical, forensic, and documentary evidence. If President Hichilema has a plan for a life presidency, produce the constitutional proposal, government documents, or authoritative statement proving it.
Until then, Sishuwa’s article remains what it increasingly resembles: not a forensic examination of Zambia’s political crisis, but a prosecutorial brief in search of evidence.
Zambia deserves better than political fiction dressed up as political scholarship.
