A Coffin Full of Secrets: How the Lungu Family Turned Death Into a Shield for Their Crimes
A Coffin Full of Secrets: How the Lungu Family Turned Death Into a Shield for Their Crimes
By Farai Ruvanyathi
14th July 2025
A court affidavit filed by Esther Lungu has finally unmasked the true reason behind the Lungu family’s insistence on burying the late President Edgar Lungu in South Africa.
It turns out, this has little, if anything, to do with his alleged “wish for privacy,” a claim for which no credible evidence has ever been presented.
A FAMILY SHROUDED IN SECRETS
Protecting Wealth, Not Honour
The motive was always clear to those paying attention. In an interview with Voice of America, Edgar Lungu himself admitted that his return to active politics was to shield his family from mounting legal scrutiny over their unexplained wealth.
Soon after leaving office, Esther Lungu entrusted her niece with US$400,000 in cash, an enormous sum by any standard, for “safe keeping.” When she later demanded it back, the niece, who now had a new car and house but no cash, was allegedly abducted and forced to hand over her property titles and vehicle.
This was not a government investigation but a private feud within the Lungu family that ended up in police hands.
When law enforcement intervened, Edgar Lungu directed his anger not at his wife’s niece, the complainant , but at President Hichilema, exposing his real concern: protecting the family’s wealth at all costs.
A CORPSE AS A SHIELD
Burying Justice Alongside the Body
Even in death, the family appears to have continued Edgar Lungu’s mission to shield them from accountability.
By insisting on burying him in South Africa, they crafted a perfect excuse to remain there in self-imposed exile, claiming proximity to his grave while conveniently avoiding court appearances in Zambia.
This legal strategy, reportedly advised by someone with legal expertise, buys them time to wait for a more sympathetic government, one that would drop the charges and investigations, allowing them to keep their ill-gotten wealth.
THE COST TO ZAMBIANS
Who Really Pays the Price?
The Lungus’ wealth was not accumulated from thin air. It came at the expense of Zambian citizens, diverted from school desks, hospitals, jobs, and critical infrastructure.
The taxes Zambians pay today are partly to service debts that financed this obscene enrichment of a single family.
This is not about President Hichilema or any single official; it is about the Zambian people, who have every right to demand accountability and justice.
THE FINAL REVEAL
Seeking Asylum, Not Privacy
When the Zambian Attorney General challenged the burial in South Africa, the family’s real plan surfaced: they are seeking political asylum in South Africa, with no intention of returning to face justice in Zambia.
We must ask: if Edgar Lungu had died in UTH or Maina Soko Military Hospital, would the family have flown his body out in the name of privacy? Or was this always a calculated move to turn his death into their shield?
QUESTIONS FOR SOUTH AFRICA AND ZAMBIA
Can We Allow This?
Should poor Zambians be robbed of their collective wealth so a criminal enterprise can hide behind a coffin?
Does it sit well with South African citizens, among the most informed and justice-conscious people in the world, that their country is being used as a haven by a family accused of plundering a neighbouring nation?
Is this the culture we want to promote: where families of public officials become overnight millionaires, then manipulate national tragedies to protect themselves?
The Lungu family’s intentions are now exposed. This is no longer just a legal battle, it is a moral reckoning.
Zambians, and indeed South Africans, must decide:
Will we allow the misuse of a dead man’s body to perpetuate theft, impunity, and injustice?
The late Edgar Lungu’s grave cannot become a sanctuary for injustice. A nation’s stolen wealth cannot be buried alongside his remains, nor can South Africa be complicit in sheltering a family that betrayed the trust of millions.
Zambians must demand accountability, and South Africans must reject being hosts to a criminal enterprise disguised as mourners. A coffin should carry a body, not a cover-up. It is time for both nations to choose justice over deceipt.
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