🇿🇲 VIEWPOINT | John Sangwa’s Reality Check
When John Sangwa launched the Movement for National Renewal (MNR), the ambition was sweeping. One million followers by December 31, 2025. A mass civic awakening driven by constitutionalism, ethics, and reform. The numbers now tell a different story. With just 34,391 followers on the party’s Facebook page, the gap is stark: a deficit of 965,609.
This is not a verdict on Sangwa’s intellect. His strongest asset remains intact. He is among Zambia’s most respected constitutional lawyers, with over 27 years of legal practice, a formidable command of the law, and a public record of principled argument. In courtrooms and studios, Sangwa has been precise, consistent, and formidable. But politics is not litigation. And the country has reminded him of that.
Zambian politics is not won by ideas alone. It is won by organisation, endurance, and presence in spaces that do not look like seminars. It requires rallies, ward structures, ground coordinators, and the slow grind of mobilisation. Sangwa is not a rally politician. He is not a mass organiser. His appeal is elite, urban, and issue-driven in a political culture that still rewards charisma, proximity, and constant visibility.
The terrain has also exposed a strategic misread. MNR launched as a “movement,” but movements in Zambia are built through networks, not platforms. Social media is an amplifier, not a base. UPND learned this the hard way over two decades in opposition. Sangwa appears to have underestimated the time and sacrifice required to translate intellectual authority into political traction.
This week’s optics have not helped. During Archbishop Alick Banda’s appearance before the Drug Enforcement Commission, Sangwa stood alongside figures from the old political class. To many observers, this blurred the line between renewal and recycling. Instead of projecting a fresh alternative, MNR looked absorbed into a familiar, bitter crowd with unresolved battles and no new organising energy.
There is also a noticeable retreat. Sangwa’s media appearances have reduced. The early momentum has slowed. Reality has set in. This is not failure; it is the first collision with political gravity. Zambia’s history shows that credibility does not convert automatically into votes. Even President Hakainde Hichilema spent years building structures before momentum followed.
If MNR is to survive, it will need patience and humility. It will need organisers, not just lawyers. It will need to leave studios for constituencies. And it will need to accept that movements are built in years, not announcements.
The numbers are unforgiving, but they are honest. They are not an insult to Sangwa’s intellect. They are a lesson in politics.
© The People’s Brief | Editors
The Editors for the People’s Brief are biased. You are not objective and realistic in your analysis. Your writings always give positive narratives to the current government especially to the President. May you kindly be factual, realistic and objective.
Politics is about ground mobilization, and once you hit the ground, that is when you begin to understand the dynamics that follow. As an example, even at just councilor level, people will not stop what they are doing in order to put food on the table, to come and listen to your ideas, they will expect some form of shock absorber from you because they feel in the time they are with, they could have generated something. Unfortunately, that is how mobilization goes in Zambia and it has come a long way to reach this level. Yes, it is not a good way of doing things, but it won’t change just now, so as long as you are in it now, you need to fall in line. People even talk about this issue openly when you visit them on the ground, they term that shock absorber as “KA SOMETHING”. and with enhanced KA SOMETHING you will have crowds, both genuine and not genuine but that is how that game goes. Mobilization at grass root level will never happen from social media, you have to be on the ground, in the trenches, in the taverns, in the compounds, in the markets, on the streets, in the bars because that is where the voter who votes is found.
We knew it was a failed project from the start.Sangwa cannot stand in the sun for even an hour.Its like Tasila Lungu wanting to be inspecting Chawama CDF projects by facebook.He even enlisted dull Sishuwa Sishuwa as campaign manager.Boombo klat!!