TUESDAY 1.30PM:
FORMER Zambian president Kenneth Kaunda returned home on Sunday for the first time since a failed coup in October against his successor President Frederick Chiluba.
Kaunda office said on Monday that he returned by road from neighboring Zimbabwe after a two-month lecture tour that also took him to Britain, the United States, India and South Africa. He was originally expected to return to Zambia earlier this month.
Kaunda, 72, was out of the country on October 28 when junior military officers seized the state broadcast centre and claimed to have overthrown Chiluba. About 90 mutinous soldiers were arrested and detained without trial under a state of emergency declared by the government soon after loyal troops quickly crushed the revolt.
Dean Mung’omba, head of the small Zambia Democratic Congress, was the only opposition politician arrested on suspicion of involvement in the attempt. He has denied the charges.
Another opposition leader, Roger Chongwe, a human rights lawyer and former legal affairs minister in the government, is in Australia and has said he is afraid to return home until colleagues advise he will be safe from arrest.