JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — The family of former Zambian President Edgar Chagwa Lungu has condemned what it describes as an unlawful postmortem conducted on his remains in Pretoria, saying Zambian officials and South African police acted in brazen defiance of a High Court order and desecrated the late president’s dignity.
The family said South African police and Zambian officials arrived at Two Mountains Funeral Services in Johannesburg on April 22, where the president’s body was being held, and pressured the morgue to release the remains without any family member present.
The body was transported to Tshwane Forensic Pathology Service in Pretoria, arriving at 6:30PM. There, the family says, a Sgt. Ngwenya and an unnamed Zambian diplomat opened a postmortem docket, with Ngwenya recording the former president as having died from “suspected poisoning” on the basis of a report by a “family member” – a claim the family categorically denies.
It says no such report exists and that the docket contained no doctor’s report on the cause of death.
When the family’s lawyers learned of the development, they urgently approached the High Court in Pretoria. Between 10PM and 11PM that night, the court issued an order mandating the immediate return of the remains to Two Mountains Funeral Services and requiring the parties to show cause why they should not be held in contempt.
Despite that order, Dr. Shirley Jena-Stuart conducted a postmortem on the president’s body at Tshwane Forensic Pathology Service from 8:30AM to 2PM the following day, the family says, acting at the direction of the Zambian government and Sgt. Ngwenya. The procedure, the family argues, was never authorised by the August 2025 court order, which dealt only with repatriation.
The facility withheld the body until approximately 9:40PM on April 23, releasing it only after the family’s lawyers engaged senior South African police officials. The family says it has since taken custody of the remains in accordance with the court order.
The family said the events amounted to “a grave abuse of power” and “contempt for the rule of law,” and reserved all legal rights to pursue justice, including through contempt proceedings.
More than 10 months after his death, Lungu’s remains are the subject of a macabre fight between his family and current President Hakainde Hichilema, the longtime rival who succeeded him.
A South African court ruled in August last year that Zambia may repatriate the remains, despite opposition from the family.
“A former president’s personal wishes or the wishes of his family cannot outweigh the right of the state to honour that individual with a state funeral,” the High Court in Pretoria ruled.
The family sought to appeal the judgment but the permitted time to do so lapsed last week. The Zambian government briefly took possession of Lungu’s body before a court ordered it returned to the family until the matter returns to court on May 21.
Lungu, Zambia’s sixth republican president, served two terms from 2015 to 2021 before losing the election to Hichilema.
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