By MICHAEL CHAWE

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Zambia’s President Edgar Lungu Wednesday declared April 28 a national holiday in honour of founding president Kenneth Kaunda.

President Lungu made the declaration during the memorial service for Kaunda held at the Cathedral of Holy Cross in the upmarket area for the late statesman. Dr Kaunda died on June 17 this year, aged 97. He had been admitted to Maina Soko Military Hospital in Lusaka and was being treated for pneumonia. He is scheduled to be buried Thursday.

Dr Kaunda was born on April 28, 1924 at Lubwa Mission, Chinsali District in the then Northern Rhodesia (current Zambia) to a reverend father and teacher mother who had migrated from neighbouring Nyasaland (current day Malawi).

During the memorial service on Wednesday, some roads were shut to facilitate movement of the cortege and the procession was broadcast live to enable more people follow as numbers were restricted due to Covid-19.

He is scheduled to be buried at the Presidential Burial Site opposite a World War cenotaph.

Late Tuesday his funeral was in a limbo after some of Kaunda’s relatives, including his son, filed a petition at the High Court seeking to stop the state from burying him at the Presidential Burial Site.

The family was seeking to bury him at his farm residence next to his wife Betty, court papers dated July 6 show.

The High Court refused to grant the late president's son, Kaweche Kaunda, leave for Judicial Review in his father's burial matter. W.G.K. Muma told Kaweche and the family members who opposed burial at the Embassy Park that public interest overrides personal interest.

During Wednesday’s memorial, his son Col Panji made no reference to the family conflict Kaunda’s burial place.

He told mourners that the family dispute they were reading in newspapers was nothing to worry about.

A military emcee at the funeral service also said that after the viewing of the body by the public, the procession would proceed to the Presidential Burial Site to Kaunda’s “final resting place.”