by AKANI CHAUKE
PRETORIA, (CAJ News) – THE family of former president of Zambia, Edgar Lungu, has failed another appeal to have him buried in South Africa.
This paves way for the repatriation of his remains for burial in his home country.
This would mean burial at the Embassy Park where other deceased ex-presidents are interred.
Lungu died on June 5 in South Africa, aged 68, when he was seeking medical treatment from an undisclosed illness.
His family, after a fallout with the current government of President Hakainde Hichilema, intended to bury him in South Africa but the Zambia government successfully appealed in South African courts to stop the process.
The Lungus appealed when the courts ruled in the government’s favour.
On Tuesday, today, the High Court of South Africa (Gauteng Division) dismissed, with costs, the application for leave to appeal.
“We are satisfied that no compelling reasons exist to grant leave to appeal simply because the matter is so fact specific that there is very little to no prospects that the same set of facts will confront a Court again,” read a ruling on Tuesday.
The parties had not commented.
However, recently, the family and government resumed talks to resolve the matter.
Lungu was Zambia’s sixth president, from 2015 to 2021.
– CAJ News