Zambia's former president Edgar Lungu, who held power for almost seven years until 2021, died Thursday in a hospital in South Africa at the age of 68, his party and family announced.
Lungu had been receiving specialised medical treatment in a clinic in Pretoria, the Patriotic Front, his political party, said in a statement. "My father had been under medical supervision in recent weeks," his daughter Tasila Lungu-Mwansa announced in a video shared on social media. "His condition was managed with dignity and privacy with support from all well-wishers," she said, without providing details of the cause of his death.
Lungu had suffered from recurring achalasia, a condition caused by narrowing of the oesophagus, for which he had been treated in South Africa.
Lungu, a trained military officer and lawyer, stepped down from the presidency in 2021 when veteran opposition leader Hakainde Hichilema, the current president, won elections by a landslide.
