ECL TO EXIT UKA NEXT MONTH, SOURCES SAY

ECL TO EXIT UKA NEXT MONTH, SOURCES SAY

By a KBN TV Reporter

Former Republican President Edgar C. Lungu (ECL) is reported to have firmed up his plans to exit the United Kwacha Alliance (UKA) in the first or second week of October, 2024 and will accept his 2026 nomination on the Tonse Alliance or People’s Pact.

Sources close to the former Head of State say ECL is displeased with how UKA handled the expulsion of Sean Tembo yet the alliance seem to have treated Saboi Imboela with kids gloves.

“The boss thinks UKA has been unfair to Sean Tembo but the alliance has failed to deal with Saboi who has issued similar statements,” says the source close to the matter.

According to our source, ECL has heaped the blame on UKA Chairperson Sakwiba Sikota whom he has accused of being biased in the manner he has handled matters especially concerning the PF.

When contacted for a comment, Sikota refused to comment saying he wasn’t aware of that position and didn’t want to give legitimacy to the claim that ECL plans to exit the alliance.

And a political analyst who spoke on condition of anonymity, said PF were making a big political gamble to bank their chances of bouncing back on the failures of the UPND Government.

“It’s not that the PF is suddenly popular, what they are attempting to do is a huge gamble, it might end up being a blunder. The truth of the matter is that the loud PF carders are making the noise and creating the perception that PF is popular when in fact not,” says the source.

He reminded this reporter of the 2011 elections when RB and the MMD thought they were popular, but ended up losing to Micheal Sata.

“I don’t know how well you remember the days of Dean Mungomba and Zadeco, it looked like a revolution and that Dean would win, but he ended up with only two seats in Parliament,” he said, adding that the same thing was witnessed with BY Mwila where the crowds seemed incredibly in support of him but he lost.

Speaking about the 2021 experience, the source said PF and ECL were pulling huge campaign crowds and they were convinced they would win, but the results shocked them despite projecting themselves as the most popular and favorites in the last election.

Asked about the 2026 permutations, the anonymous political analyst claims with UPND, UKA and PF under Tonse Alliance in the race, there might be no outright winner which will call for a rerun, adding that given the way PF are going about antagonizing political relationships, they might find it difficult to back UKA or vice versa during the rerun.

Other sources claim that UKA adopted a tactical approach to manage several key stakeholders who hinted that the Alliance would lose support should they endorse ECL as the 2026 flag bearer.

“Contrary to what people think, UKA has been doing a lot of bargaining in the background with a lot of influential organisations and critical voices that have made it very categorical that if the alliance picks the former Head of State as its flag bearer, they should forget about getting the support because that will be taking the country back to days of caderism and lawlessness,” the source said, adding that these are critical matters that UKA has been dealing with respectfully to try and align everyone and at the same time minimize the risk of losing support.