It looks like HH has now become the UPND manifesto – Kabimba
By Kholiwe Miti
ECONOMIC Front (EF) president Wynter Kabimba has wondered why UPND members do not explain their manifesto to the public.
Featuring on Diamond TV’s Costa programme, Kabimba said instead of explaining the UPND manifesto everyone including ministers keep referring to the Head of State.
“I have never heard anybody since UPND came into power talk about the UPND manifesto. A manifesto is the programme of the party. And that programme of the party must be marketed to the civil service, and civil servants must have to understand exactly the direction in which this party which has won the mandate of the people wants to go,” he said.
“It must implement the manifesto of the party in power. They have failed because when you listen now it looks like President Hichilema has now become the manifesto. And a lot of what he says is what is his opinion and not the framework which is shared by everybody else. Now that’s not how you run government.”
And Kabimba advised President Hichilema to “step back and distinguish between politics and competence in his appointees”.
“The majority of his appointees are inexperienced about government functions, about how government is run. He is introducing more cadreism than what we have ever seen before. He is pursuing this policy of rewarding those that he thinks will continue to glorify him. He is leaving out people that are competent,” he noted.
“He wants to clean up the civil service even up to director level and bring in his own people. You can’t cleanse the civil service; it is a system that has been running for years, in two years, in five years. The IMF tried this in the 90s, tried to restructure the civil service. It’s a complex machinery.”
Kabimba said majority of appointments made by the President are not out of meritocracy like he promised the Zambian people.
He said President Hichilema should not see firing of people as a solution but should market his ideas to the people so that they can understand his will for the people.
“So when you want to crowd Cabinet [Office], for example, with the so-called PS in charge of special duties, clearly what you are saying is that I have become a labour officer. I know almost everybody HH has been able to appoint. I know their profiles, I know what they have done in the past and what they haven’t done. And when I see them being placed in certain positions I say to myself ‘oh my God, how can this person execute this function? It’s too heavy a burden for him or her’. So really, maybe that’s what he wants to do but he’s not doing it,” said Kabimba.
“The blame game that he wants to be running with by blaming ministers, blaming people in the civil service, is not what is going to help because days are running. So he needs to make sure that the people around him, starting from State House and beyond; State House are men and women that are competent. Sometimes it is not about firing people but about making people understand what you want done. Firing must be the last straw to break the camel’s back. What the President must do is market his ideas. If he has ideas spread them out to all his men so that everybody understands that when they talk about corruption this is exactly what they mean. When they talk about maize marketing this is exactly what they mean. When he wants to talk about procurement this is what they mean. If he doesn’t do that he will be firing people every week. And you know what that does, everybody becomes insecure and sits back, he is instilling fear in the civil servants.”