By Dr Nevers Mumba
MY COUNSEL TO CHELLAH TUKUTA:
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In the past few days, inappropriate content and pictures involving and depicting one, Cornelius Tukuta Chellah have been circulating on social media. My interest to make a comment arises from the fact that, Cornelius has been working on our media team as a photographer.
To say the least, the pictures have been gross and none of us in the team ever thought our greatly talented young man would take such an immoral detour from the values that we all consider critical to national building. As leader of the New Hope MMD, I wish to place it on record that I condemn this inappropriate behavior and distance the party from the character that Cornelius has depicted over the past few days.
Every leader faces moments when someone around them suffers a moral setback, becomes corrupt or just goes rogue. At this moment it’s the leader’s values and strength of leadership which are on trial. Since these assistants are usually very close and sometimes even humanly “indispensable” most leaders fail to provide leadership in such moments. It is such inaction to speak out against the wrongs of those close to us that shows our own failure to provide leadership.
Cornelius is a gifted young man. A prolific photographer of international acclaim. He is a CNN Africa Photographer Award Winner. He is one of Zambia’s best. It is therefore extremely painful for me to see him sink so low morally and pose a threat to the very standard of morals that have brought us together as a team.
The sanctity of family is the bedrock of any resilient society. Cornelius is a married man with two beautiful children. His responsibility is to love his wife and children and protect them from anything that could harm them including public ridicule. His conduct therefore is highly regrettable.
While some leaders may publicly disown one who falters as Cornelius has, we have decided to provide counseling and help for him to overcome this moral failure. We trust the Lord that in his mercy, our young man shall rise up and be the responsible husband, father and citizen he needs to be. We condemn his behavior but we reach out for his healing.
In working through this restitution we expect that Cornelius shall offer a full hearted apology to both his family and to the many friends that have held him in high esteem.
Until this is done he has been advised that He WILL NOT to carry out any role in the New Hope MMD media team. We consider character to be more useful than the gift he has. We remain hopeful that the counsel and measures taken shall assist in bringing restoration to Mr Chellah.
