Prominent Zambian politician and former cabinet minister Derrick Chitala was attacked and beaten during a raid by 15 gunmen on his Lusaka home, Zambian news reports said on Monday. A police spokesman was quoted as saying that the armed men stormed Chitala’s house in the up market suburb of Ibex Hill early on Friday morning. He added that the politician managed to disarm one of his attackers before others beat him on the head.
Chitala said the assailants had told him they had been sent to kill him, but did not specify by whom. The attack on Chitala came just two weeks after the murder of Paul Tembo, a former aide of Zambian president Frederick Chiluba, at his house, also in Ibex Hill.
Tembo’s murder was widely seen as politically motivated since he had recently defected to join the opposition Forum for Democracy and Development formed by disgruntled ex-ministers who were purged from the ruling Movement for Multiparty Democracy.
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