ABOUT PSYCHOTIC BEHAVIOR: A CASE OF SOME POLITICAL ALLIANCES WANTING ECL ON THEIR SIDE BUT NOT HIS PF PARTY- Sean Tembo

ABOUT PSYCHOTIC BEHAVIOR: A CASE OF SOME POLITICAL ALLIANCES WANTING ECL ON THEIR SIDE BUT NOT HIS PF PARTY

By Sean Tembo – PeP President

1. Ever since l decided to join active politics about 6 years ago, l have come across all sorts of politicians in both the ruling and opposition parties. Strange characters and occasionally very strange characters. And just when l thought l had seen it all, l now seem to have met a new breed; the unreasonable and unrealistic. Since 2021, the opposition have worked fervently to try and create various groupings and platforms in the name of alliances, which include the United Kwacha Alliance (UKA), The People’s Pact, The Zambia We Want, and more recently we hear that there is a new alliance being launched called The Tonse Alliance.

2. However, what l find strange about some of these alliances is the behavior of some of their members towards the 6th Republican President and his PF party. They seem overjoyed to relate to and be in the company of President Lungu, but they vilify and insult his PF party on a daily basis, either directly or through their paid proxies. Even when they take group photos, they fight tooth and nail to be the ones standing next to ECL, like children at a Christmas party wanting to stand next to Santa Claus. When they organize their tuma rallies, they rely on ECL to give them life by way of his political clout and financial backing. While in the same breath, they treat his Vice President, his Secretary General, his Party senior members like useless lepers, and can’t even see eye to eye with them. What hypocrisy!!!

3. The bottom line is that ECL is a leader of an organization, and that organization is called the Patriotic Front. Anyone who wants to engage in serious political business with ECL, must equally be ready to engage with and respect the organization which he represents; which is the Patriotic Front. Any alliance where some members believe that they can divorce ECL from his PF party and just use him to prop up their political standing, through their public association with him, is unlikely to go anywhere. Any alliance that thinks ECL is vulnerable and desperate for political association, simply because the UPND interfered with the registration status of the PF at the Registrar of Societies and installed stooges, is not going anywhere.

4. A serious alliance is supposed to treat President Lungu with the respect that he deserves, both as a former Head of State as well as the leader of the largest opposition political party in Zambia. And l dare say that despite the shenanigans of the ruling UPND, the PF has remained intact at grassroots level. In fact, the PF is stronger and more organized at grassroots level than even the ruling UPND party. And some alliance leaders think they can treat the leader of the largest opposition political party with contempt? Where is the logic in doing so? Unless of course they are being sponsored by the ruling UPND party to cause confusion in such an alliance?

5. Truth be told, any equation that will culminate into the removal of the ruling UPND party from office in 2026 will need to involve President Edgar Lungu and his PF party, in one way or the other. Either directly as a candidate or through his endorsement of a particular preferred candidate. Suffice to mention that President Lungu and the PF party are a package. Any alliance that decides to do business with ECL must equally be ready to do business with and respect his political party, the Patriotic Front. And to the extent that a particular alliance, either out of their own volition and poor judgement or through infiltration by the ruling UPND party, decide to disrespect ECL or try to tear him away from his PF party, then under those circumstances, ECL would reserve the right to divorce himself from any such compromised alliance, and seek any other alternative platform that would be available to him.

6. It is worth noting that ECL’s greatest currency is the fact that he is a former Head of State and leader of the largest opposition political party in Zambia. Any political player in Zambia who is worth their salt, would have come to the realization of the fact that the allegiance of PF structures across the country, to ECL, is cult-like. The two are inseparable. The ruling UPND have tried to sponsor confusion in the PF, even to the extent of changing it’s office bearers at Registrar of Societies and installing stooges. But all these machinations have failed, until the stooges started fighting amongst themselves. The PF structures have remained intact in their unwavering support and dedication to ECL. Rather admirable, wouldn’t you say?

7. But perhaps the unavoidable question that should be asked is; would President Edgar Lungu’s return to power be in the best interests of the nation? Well, if you asked me this question a year ago, my answer would have been a definite no. But today, l hold a different position. l do earnestly believe that President Edgar Lungu’s return to power in 2026 would be a very progressive development for the nation. Why do l say so? Well, to be honest with you, the first reason is that ECL is the only candidate who has the necessary critical mass to easily remove President Hakainde Hichilema from office. So it really depends on how badly you want HH gone in 2026. If you are as fed up as l am with President Hakainde Hichilema’s corruption, incompetence, vengeance and lack of patriotism, and you really want him gone in 2026, then ECL is the only tenable vehicle to be used. Now, you need to hear me clearly here; l am not saying that other leaders are completely incapable of removing HH from office in 2026. We are all capable, including myself. We are just less tenable. Other than ECL, none of us currently have the necessary critical mass to remove President Hakainde Hichilema from office in 2026. But l want you to mark my use of the word “currently” in the previous sentence. I am emphasizing the use of the word “currently” because in future, it is possible that one of us may be able to amaze the necessary critical mass needed to remove President Hakainde Hichilema in 2026, but such a candidate will only be able to acquire such critical mass through transmission, by way of endorsement by President Edgar Lungu. In other words, the most ideal person that can remove HH from office in 2026 is ECL, and the next most ideal person is the candidate whom ECL endorses.

8. At this point, am sure that some of you are itching to ask me what has changed about ECL’s governance in the 7 years prior to 2021? Something that l vehemently fought against, and yet today am saying that the nation would be best served with ECL’s return to office in 2026. Why? Well, l personally found ECL’s presidency inadequate because l measured it against my expectations, and l believe many Zambians did that as well. And l need to quickly add that our expectations of how a Government needed to perform were largely shaped by what the then Opposition Leader, Mr. Hakainde Hichilema told us. When the country was undergoing 6 hours load-shedding during the 2015 drought, HH told us that 6 hrs was unacceptable and that drought should not be accepted as an excuse for load-shedding. When the PF gave each farmer 6 bags of fertilizer as part of FISP, Mr. Hakainde Hichilema told us that the 6 bags were not enough. When fuel was at K17 a liter, Mr. Hakainde Hichilema told us that it was too expensive. When the President Lungu decided to buy back Mopani from Glencore so that it is state-owned, Mr. Hakainde Hichilema told us that it was a bad idea. And because of the false expectations that the then Opposition Leader, Mr. Hakainde Hichilema created among the Zambian people, the people, including myself, decided to judge President Lungu harshly.

9. In retrospect, Mr. Edgar Chagwa Lungu was a far better President than Mr. Hakainde Hichilema across all measures. Talk about the fight against corruption, President Lungu at least had four Cabinet Ministers prosecuted for alleged corruption in courts of law, whereas President Hakainde Hichilema is completely unable to do so, even when one of his Ministers is captured on video receiving wads of cash. Talk about caderism, President Hakainde Hichilema has simply replaced the panga wielding PF cadres with the gun wielding Zambia Police cadres. Personally, under PF l was assaulted by panga wielding cadres along Cairo Road, and under UPND, l was assaulted by gun wielding Zambia Police cadres who broke into my house, assaulted me in front of my children and proceeded to kidnap me and torture me for two days until l was discovered by my relatives at Balmoral Police Station in the outskirts of Lusaka. Talk about debt contraction, during his 7 years in office, President Edgar Lungu contracted about K60 billion of domestic debt, which moved from about K29 billion at the inception of his Presidency in January 2015, to about K89 billion when he handed over the instruments of power on 24th August 2021, but we were able to see tangible infrastructure projects across the country, including a total facelift of Lusaka City. On the other hand, President Hakainde Hichilema has contracted about K205 billion in domestic debt over a period of 3 years, which has moved from about K89 billion when he took office, to about K245 billion at present, and there isn’t a single infrastructure project to point at. The point that l am trying to make here, country men and women, is that President Lungu was a far better President than President Hakainde Hichilema. In fact, if l was allowed to rate the two, l would give ECL a 70 percent and HH a 15 percent. And on any day of the week, moving from 15 percent and back to 70 percent is a good deal for the nation.

10. In the premises above, President Edgar Lungu deserves respect by the entire nation for what he was able to achieve for Zambia during his stay in office, which President Hakainde Hichilema had promised us he will surpass, but which he has dismally failed to even match. Above all, ECL deserves respect from those political leaders who decide to congregate with him in the name of alliances. Any political leader who wants ECL’s company and association, but cannot stand his PF party, has no business with ECL, because ECL comes as a package and that package includes the PF party. As for me and my party, we have resolved to work with ECL and his PF party in order to ensure that President Hakainde Hichilema is removed from office in 2026, without fail. Our decision is premised on the fact that we are not naive. We know fully well that there can be no regime change without the involvement of ECL and the PF party. And we need regime change in 2026 at all costs. In order to achieve our 2026 goals, we shall ride on any appropriate alliance platform, whether it be UKA, Tonse Alliance, The People’s Pact or The Zambia We Want Alliance. The only precondition for our association on any alliance platform will be that it be composed of genuine opposition political party leaders who are serious about regime change, and not surrogates of the ruling UPND party who get brown envelopes from Community House every evening, with instructions of how to frustrate the candidature of ECL on the ballot in 2026. The only man whom the UPND knows is unquestionably capable of removing them in 2026. My message to these surrogates of UPND in some of these alliances is simple: there shall be regime change in 2026, the only question is whether you will be part of it or not.

Anyway, the Future is SET ✌🏼✌🏼✌🏼

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SET 09.09.2024