Mundubile’s argument rested on the Constitutional Court ruling that invalidated the process leading to Bill 7. According to him, once the Court pronounced itself, the Bill ceased to exist. Yet the Speaker allowed it to be re-tabled, and a technical committee appointed by President Hakainde Hichilema went around the country carrying the same clauses under a different cover. For Mundubile, this was not consultation but an attempt to resuscitate the dead Bill 7.
Mundubile remains one of the party’s sharpest public communicators, but his comments suggest that the road to PF unity may be far more fragile than he admitted. If reconciliation becomes a euphemism for factional restoration, the PF risks repeating the same internal mistakes that pushed it into opposition.
It was the President, after all, who first dismissed the clergy as political actors. It was the President who accused priests of hiding behind the Church. That wound still stands. No letter from a junior official can sanitise a presidential insult.
Bill 7 is no longer a legislative proposal. It is a test of conscience, legality and national stability. MPs must understand that this vote will follow them long after today’s political alliances have dissolved.
Constitutional lawyer John Sangwa, SC, says that Bill No. 7 of 2025 “has no legal existence” and cannot be debated, revived, or acted upon by Parliament.
Viewers across the country saw a President apparently willing to engage, dialogue, and find common ground. But according to insiders who witnessed the private meeting, the tone shifted immediately once journalists were ushered out. What followed was not negotiation, but a declaration.
Fresh from a tense meeting at State House where she openly told President Hakainde Hichilema to withdraw Bill 7 and prioritise the Bill of Rights, Oasis Forum Chairperson Beauty Katebe has announced that the next phase of dialogue will involve a smaller, more focused negotiating team.
Katebe’s intervention reflects a deepening sense of public unease as the administration attempts to push Bill 7 through Parliament before recess.
Speaking on Millennium Radio, PF presidential aspirant Makebi Zulu warned that the current process risks producing a constitution designed by the government instead of the people whose lives it governs.
The regional body SADC has formally acknowledged the Patriotic Front’s alarm over rising threats to Zambia’s democracy, signaling the clearest indication yet that the regional bloc is watching the situation with sharpened attention.